500 words a day on whatever I want

Mercutio Southall

Mercutio Southall (c. 1985- ), a Black Lives Matter protester, was beat up at a Donald Trump rally in Birmingham, Alabama on November 21st 2015.

Afterwards, Trump, who is running for US president, said:

“Maybe he should have been roughed up because it was absolutely disgusting what he was doing.”

The disgusting thing he was doing was shouting “Black Lives Matter!” at a Trump rally of several thousand people (nearly all White, in a city that is 73% Black).

When Southall began shouting, Trump said:

“Get him the hell out of here! Throw him out.”

The crowd cheered. Six or so White men began beating him up.

Southall:

“I got punched in the face, I got punched in the neck. I got kicked in the chest. Kicked in the stomach. Somebody stepped on my hand.”

They told him, “Go home, nigger.” They called him and fellow protesters “monkeys”. They said, “All lives matter!”

Security took him away, but no one else.

CNN caught some of it on video before security forced them back into their “media pen”.

Trump then said of Bernie Sanders (whose rally in Seattle in August was interrupted by Black Lives Matter protesters Marissa Johnson and Mara Willaford):

“You see, he was politically correct. Two young women came up to the podium. They took over his microphone. I promise you, that’s not going to happen with me.”

This was hardly the first time Trump supporters have been violent. In August two of them beat up a homeless Latino man with a metal pipe and reportedly urinated on him. When Trump heard about it, he said:

“I will say that people who are following me are very passionate. They love this country and they want this country to be great again.”

He got heat for that and later said he “would never condone violence” and that “we must treat each other with respect.”

Southall’s family comes from Selma, where some of them marched with Martin Luther King, Jr in 1965. His mother named him for the character in Shakespeare’s “Romeo & Juliet”. He used to play semi-pro football with the Birmingham Diamondbacks.

When he was at police academy, he hurt his knee and failed the running test by 15 seconds. So he started his own security company, MercSouth Security.

Since 2013, he has been roughed up, tased and arrested many times for his protesting.

Some say he is just being a troublemaker. Southall says:

“If I was doing something for myself, I would have stopped when they took my business, I would have stopped when they took my weapons, I would have stopped when they took my motorcycle, I would have stopped when they tased me, I would have stopped when they were pointing guns at my face, I would have stopped when I didn’t have a place to sleep at night.”

Of Black Lives Matter:

“If we weren’t making a difference, if we weren’t raising the awareness, if we weren’t making people uncomfortable, then why have we been persecuted?”

– Abagond, 2015.

Upate (December 16th): Yet another racist incident at a Trump rally, two days ago in Las Vegas.

While a Black Lives Matter protester was being manhandled by security, Trump supporters were shouting stuff like:

“Kick his ass!” “Shoot him!” “Light the motherfucker on fire!”

As another protester was removed, someone shouted:

“Sieg heil!”

It gets worse, as BuzzFeed reports:

“Trump, meanwhile, gleefully narrated the madness from his podium like a tabloid talk show host presiding over an on-camera brawl between guests — egging on the confrontation, whipping the audience into a frenzy, and basking in his fans’ celebratory chants.

“Trump! Trump! Trump! Trump!”

“This is what we should have been doing to the other side for the last seven years!” Trump exclaimed during one of the scuffles with protesters.”

Share this post:

Like this:

171 Responses

Donald Trump is one of white nationalists’ favorite leaders. Trump has thuggish race soldiers (white cops) and race bangers (white extremists) to protect him from people who oppose his political viewpoints.

Donald Trump is a vile and disgusting rodent and he gets these color aroused racist foaming at the mouth like rabid dogs. He is a mirror of the oppressive society of white supremacy he is what many racist want for a leader in this country and it’s scary. Mercutio Southall is a brave man standing up for what he believes in the face of such opposition.

Wait, so this man, Mercutio Southall, has lost his business do to his activism with the BLM movement?
Also,

@Somaliprince

So basically, humans live in a kill or be killed world? If I want my people to be on top, we need to oppress, and if I don’t want them to be, I should accept lower status within another’s “empire”? Not that I necessarily disagree with that logic, but it seems rather like the old “survival of the fitness” belief system.

Yup, exactly. In the International Arena, there is no morality. Only the 11 Immutable Laws of the Game of Empires stand.

These laws are drawn from the Art of War.

Morality only exists within a society.

This morality is born out of the Social Contract between the Empire and its people.

The Empire must guarantee morality to keep the Civilians happy.

But Remember:

2 – Civilians are not part of the Game. If their Empire wins, they may live a life of tranquility. If their Empire loses, they may face rape, slaughter and pillaging. As such, you must never blame a civilian for its Empire’s actions. They are but pawns.

3 – If an Empire’s civilians do not believe a war justified, the Empire will ‘find’ the necessary evidence to convince the civilians that it is.

4 – War is an Empire’s natural state. Peace can only be guaranteed within the confines of the Empire. If you do not wish to play the Game and do not wish to be a victim of the Empire’s machinations, migrate to the Empire’s interior – by any means necessary.

9 – Never underestimate your enemy. Always be respectful and courteous to your rival. Accept that you may one day be in his position and that he may one day be in yours. If your enemy is stronger, respect his strength and learn from him as much as you can. If you are to defeat him, you must learn the secrets of his ways.

And if you are white, I have no feelings of bitterness towards you. There are some victim-black on this messageboard that will ask you to return money to them based on historical events. Please ignore them.

Trump has tapped into neo-nativism. Its pro white/American/Christian and anti everything else. I suspect Trump will get the Republican nomination.

I think if Trump runs against Hillary,Trump wins. I believe that more then 50% of the country are bigots whether Americans admit it or not. And this nativism crosses party lines according to this poll.

The U.S. already has the frame work of economic fascism in place. All it needs now is a leader to point fingers and play into xenophobic and racist fears. People will believe his economic populism over whatever Hillary or the Democrats put out, because he’s a business man who “cuts deals”. Americans will think he can create jobs for them because he knows how to “negotiate”.
“He’s gonna go talk to the Chinese” ect

Mercutio Southall is an American exercising his right to freedom of speech and he got beat up for it. That’s the direction the country is going.

I don’t want to derail this thread with a full critique of Social Contract Theory so I’ll post this and leave it at that.

“It could be argued that African-Americans have a right to revolution because America is no longer respecting the Social Contract.”

Blacks were never apart of the Social Contract because they were never viewed as human or equals.

It was the social contract that allowed manifest destiny and the genocide of Native Americans. Native Americans were never part of this imaginary contract nor did they get any of the privileges “the constitution” provided other Americans. The colonizers social contract was their death sentence.

It’s no different then the idea that a privileged people are doing “gods will” when they go off to war or commit genocide.

It’s a deflection in favor of the State at the expense of some individuals based on the collectivism of the ruling group. The Social Contract acts a pass taking away personal moral responsibility for the acts of individuals who do heinous acts like lynching.

It was the social contract that allowed Jim Crow to be the law of the land, that allowed Japanese interment, and the bombing of Hiroshima.

“Simply put, a contract can’t be seen as consensual if the other party to the contract uses force to make refusal impossible.” Lysander Spooner

The Social Contract permitted slavery. It is also used to conscript citizens into war against their personal objections.

My construct is based on Natural Rights. I can’t “prove” Natural Rights exist, I just assume they do the same way a theist assumes God exists.

“Working from the assumption that humans enjoy Natural Rights, it is impossible for a person to transfer their inalienable rights away. This is because rights are part of the essence that defines mankind, they are not an exterior phenomenon, but an integral definition of what it is to be human.” Rothbard

Trump is a loud mouth racist prick! His whole platform is just a soft version of white nationalism. He plays off of people’s fears. And his rallies are starting to look more like KKK rallies. If Trump were to become President I would consider leaving the country.

You bring up some interesting points, especially about how the Jews and Chinese – two historically marginalized minority groups – responded to the oppression by building up their own sources of power. However, a key ingredient to that seems to be the acquisition or possession of their own lands where their own people could effectively congregate, organize and regroup. The Chinese had China and their own tightly-woven ethnic enclaves, the Jews got Israel and their own tightly-woven communities and social structures.

Meanwhile, black Americans don’t have an entire country filled with people who look, think and act like them to fall back on. And the close-knit ethnic enclaves we did have wound up scattered to the four winds in the face of integration, black America’s adoption of America’s “Rugged Individualism” mystique and the dogged interference of state and federal authorities whenever black Americans did attempt to create and solidify serious movements that would have provoked serious change.

Do we become Israel, or do we become Auschwitz?

Considering how things are going, black America’s preference to plead for coexistence with white America probably speaks to a subconscious attempt to stave off the latter, which explains why we’ve never seriously asked for the former. A lot of black Americans still wholeheartedly believe that we can live in peace and harmony with these people.

Creating a separate, sovereign nation seems logical, but it does beg a few questions:

1) Where? The most logical place would be the Southeast U.S., which was mostly built off of our backs, but the latent Confederate contingent would have plenty to say about that. Even with that problem somehow magically resolved, it brings me to another question:
2) How would you guarantee that this new nation of ours would be free of any undue interference? Haiti, the D.R. and a whole host of Caribbean and African nations can attest to U.S. govt. meddling in some form or fashion.

As for building capital, building it overtly is out of the question and has been for a very long time. It’ll have to be done covertly, in ways that are beneath the radar of a nation that sees black self-improvement and enrichment as an existential threat.

@Deb: Glad to see someone else spotted the contradiction in their rhetoric. I was about to post something about that but then, there you were. When it comes time for the rubber to hit the road, “all lives matter” turns out to actually mean “NOT all lives matter”.

However, a key ingredient to that seems to be the acquisition or possession of their own lands where their own people could effectively congregate, organize and regroup. The Chinese had China …
the Jews got Israel

Normally I appreciate your insight, but I see a stark and spurious fallacy here.

If you are going to compare the Jewish diaspora and the Chinese diaspora to the African diaspora, then compare like with like. Saying the Chinese have China and the Jews have Israel is like saying blacks have Africa. That is tantamount to saying nothing.

If you are going to say black Americans, then say Jewish Americans and Chinese Americans, neither of which “have” Israel or China respectively. They do, or at least did have ethnic enclaves in America, but one could argue so do / did black Americans.

Therefore,

Meanwhile, black Americans don’t have an entire country filled with people who look, think and act like them to fall back on.

Neither do Jewish Americans or Chinese Americans.

Arguably, some Native American groups DO have a “nation” filled with people who look, think and act like them to fall back on. However, that does not mean that they are capable of exercising much power regarding self-determination as they would like.

Of course, the black experience is different, but if you are going to compare with other groups, at least compare like with like.

Creating a separate, sovereign nation seems logical

What is your idea here? Like American Indian nations? like Haiti?

beneath the radar of a nation that sees black self-improvement and enrichment as an existential threat.

Arguably, both the Jewish and Chinese American experience are seen as an existential threat, some of which is beneath the radar, some not. Could you expound why you might choose not to compare the experience here (but do it further above in contexts that are perhaps less directly comparable).

Native Americans are also seen as an existential threat, as I have learned. Their land rights and sovereignty are definitely perceived as very threatening to white interests, who have sought to undermine them even before the first African arrived.

“I suspect Trump will get the Republican nomination…I think if Trump runs against Hillary,Trump wins.”

I suspect the opposite. The Republican elites want Jeb Bush, that’s to where most money has gone, and they’ll settle for Cruz or Rubio in order to get more Latino voters. I think they’ll find some way to prevent Trump from getting the nomination, and don’t forget that the Bushes are no strangers to rigging an election.

Clinton is also leading Trump in most polls, and this type of news doesn’t help Trump with blacks, Latinos and most white women.

So “All lives matter” is just a phrase that is used by white Americans to say “Shut up!” to black people. Saddening, but not surprising, from what I’ve read over here.

If those “All lives matter”-people did something positive, like advocating gun-control, and condemning police-violence in general (and thus backing the BLM-movement, for having shared goals), I would have been with them.

But hey, it is not the first time that a cause at first glance looks good, but doesn’t if you look further.

F-ck Trump! The GOP is the party of racism. No sane person should vote for him, ever. Or any other Republican candidate. What we need is a POLITICAL REVOLUTION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Vote for Bernie!!!!!!!!”

Well, well, what have we here? Lordy, weren’t you the guy threatening militants of the same group, women, no less, with violence for interrupting Bernie’s rally? What is it that you have in common with Trump’s thugs that you are in denial about? When is Bernie going to call for the nationalization of finance and basic industries like a good socialist should?

I saw those fake statistics. He put those out the next day, as if to excuse violence against Blacks by his supporters. He later admitted they were wrong when Bill O’Reilly questioned him about it. He said it was a retweet, that he does not have time to fact-check (his defamation of others). That he even thought they were believable tells you something.

A defamation Trump has NOT (yet) taken back, as far as I know, is his claim he made during the Birmingham speech that “thousands and thousands” of Arab Americans in Jersey City, New Jersey cheered the fall of the Twin Towers on 9/11, that he saw it on television. No such thing took place. I think he is being sincere – he is hardly the only American who “remembers” that. But what his brain has done is to see no difference between Arab Americans and Arabs overseas and mix them up. The perpetual foreigner stereotype.

They are protesting for the same cause. How is it right in one case but wrong in the other? Sounds like a double standard. Whatever happened to free speech? Or is that just for racially insensitive Yale professors?

FDR imprisoned almost 120,000 American citizens and residents for their race in a single executive order. If someone protested against that action, they should be frowned upon? Because it is somehow not as bad as what someone else did?

If Obama does something wrong, people should be free to protest.
If Sanders does something wrong, people should be free to protest.
If Trump does something wrong, people should be free to protest.

It’s not the same cause, though. An injury to Donald Trump is an aid to the cause of democratic socialism. An injury to Bernie Sanders is the opposite.

If a group of protesters had somehow managed to attack both Hitler and FDR, I would support the anti-Hitler ones and frown upon the anti-Roosevelt ones on the same principle.

You have to think really big-picture. In the long run, protests against Bernie Sanders hurt America, while protests against Donald Trump help save its soul.”

What delicious bit of sophistry! You write like someone who studied at the Stalin school of falsification. Your words bring to mind the defenders of Stalin who were willing to lie and cover-up his crimes in the name of “socialism”. Threatening women with violence because you don’t like what they said and did is just thuggish, so is the worship of the leader who can’t be questioned. It doesn’t matter if he’s called Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Trump, Roosevelt, or Sanders. By the way, do you know that in the long run we’ll all be dead?

I’ve been thinking a lot about free speech lately and I believe it comes down to being able to speak freely without getting shut down and also being able to defend it.

In the case of Southall if he had fought off his attackers he would have been arrested for assault and the headline would have been “BLM protestor attacks Trump supporters”.

In the case of Yale if a black face student got into the personal space of a Black person “in fun” and the Black student punched back that student would have been expelled as the aggressor and the black face student would have been protected by “free speech”.

I’m not to sure about the self defense part of my argument so I’m putting it out here.

I think they want to suppress BLM because the movement is creating sparks of revolution in America. This is the best time to revolt but are the people courageous enough to create a wave behind BLM and destroy the bankers? I want Americans to wake up-all Americans- because when they do that the fire will spread all over the world and I won’t have to care about the British elite or China or whatever.

There’s got a be a bette wya BLM can approach and speak out. Dude might as well have showed up in the middle of a dangerous Klan rally… What is done to him cannot be psychologically undone. The physical, verbal, and emotional attacks will forever be with this brother from this very instance.

@mike4ty4 & The Pragmatist..These folk aren’t smart, they don’t have to be. In a world where comb-over guy’s leading in the polls, saying everything they haven’t had the cojones to say out loud (except at the Changeling, who better be glad he’s got Secret Service for life cuz I think he’s going to need them, though they’ve not been most vigilant during his two terms to date) — he’s speaking for them and, based on Mr. Southall’s attack along with the “shots fired” in Minneapolis, he’s “firing them up and they’re ready to go.”

This man is dangerous for us “Others,” particularly since we, “Others” seem not to be willing or able to separate the wheat from the chaff, believing, as Mack Lyons said above, “…that we can live in peace and harmony with these people.”

Do I think we can, with some of them — yes. But we cannot forget, and we cannot overlook when those with whom we can’t, show themselves to us. As Maya Angelou counseled, “We better believe them.”

Like I said, these folk aren’t smart. Trump’s emboldened those with whom we can’t live in peace and harmony (including himself!). For that, I’m grateful. However, if we don’t “believe them,” and keep living this utopian dream (read: night-damned-mare), the majority of us “Others,” will find ourselves up the creek without a paddle.

Mack Lyon’s posts are eloquent but it doesn’t stop him from making fallacious statements, like claiming that diasporic Africans are distinct from Africans while not applying that same standard to diasporic Chinese or Jews.

I wasn’t trying to imply this, but it seems that I’ve definitely stepped on a landmine here.

I’ll try to make my point clearer: the presence of a relatively powerful and globally respected “home” country with the same relative ethnic makeup has helped give its diaspora a certain degree of “clout,” since most Americans who do think in monolithic terms believe that the diaspora have a “base” that’ll go to bat on their behalf.

Black Americans, on the other hand, don’t have that same sort of perceived clout. Most of the African nations are not perceived as being powerful or respected and the ramifications of slavery and how it stripped away any and all traces of tribal or national identity has made it difficult for anyone to link black Americans with any one particular African ethnic group, let alone nation.

I guess it’s like the kids on the playground knowing that one particular kid has a big brother that’ll go to bat for him if the bullies try to pick on him. I know it sounds extremely silly and it discounts the diasporas’ capability and capacity to fight and win their own battles, but that’s how most mainstream Americans think, IMHO.

I have just attempted to watch (I could not go through with it) the video of a young Black man being shot 16 times by a police officer.

These words are more important than ever.

@MackLyons but also @Jefe –

There are two main streams of thought: ‘The White Man is Evil’ and ‘The Game of Empires’.

Proponents of the first cannot escape their White Man obsession. Many (but not all) are what I call victim-black.

They complain about Hollywood’s depiction of the ‘other’ (what did you expect? Propaganda is a tool employed by all Empires),
they cheer for the olive branches that the Empire throws at them to keep them passively satiated and, worst of all, they ask for compensation. Ask?

When you are in a position of dominance, it is then that you exact a tribute. The Jewish only exacted theirs once the Nazis had been defeated.

There is a strong Jewish contingent in America that has not only accumulated capital but is influential. We must learn from this.

Proponents of the second stream of thought acknowledge that ALL human beings have weaknesses, that we are all competing and that there is no harm in trying to win.

The White Man is our competitor, that does not mean we must hate him, that does not mean we must show him antipathy.

We must appropriate his strengths and avoid the mistakes he has committed. We must surpass him.

But as instructed by Niccolò Machiavelli (I paraphrase): ‘Deceive to achieve’.

For instance:

A Trojan Horse was used to conquer Troy.

America is now Troy, the AA is perfectly placed to be that Trojan Horse.

Emotions such as hatred, bitterness, entitlement and resentment do not exist. The Game will punish those that let emotions cloud their judgement.

Proponents of the first stream would neglect facts in favour of emotion. Proponents of the second use the facts to build an appropriate strategy.

The facts remain that African Americans still have the lowest median income per household compared to other groups,
African Americans are still being shot in the streets and African Americans are still being incarcerated at an astounding rate compared to other ethnicities.

Furthermore, the current Empire is White. We are ‘other’. Whatever the Empire says, we will always be ‘other’.

The current Empire is the most powerful entity there has ever been in the history of mankind. Although it may be weakening, there currently exists
an alliance between the USA and Western Europe (NATO), Oceania (Five Eyes), Israel (UN – Power of Veto) and Japan (US-Japan Security Alliance).

Considering the sheer dominance of this alliance, it is surprising that China has been able to make any headway at all. It is my belief that China was underestimated, because China plays the Game well:

‘Do not be afraid of the darkness, revel in it. For, whilst you are out of sight, you will have the opportunity to build your strength.’

But there are also facts in our favour.

There exists a Trojan Horse in the White Empire: African Americans.

Furthermore, as everyone knows, Africa is the world’s richest continent. Africa’s population is booming at an incredible rate.

Technology is providing even more means to tame Africa’s landscape.

More and more Africans are studying at some of the top universities in the Empire.

And now I move on to the second part.

When I mentioned the link Asian Americans have with their homeland, @Jefe responded with:

“Where do you get these ideas?”

Jefe, you seem to have an entirely different perception of race.

I gave an example earlier: Adele is European White, she is currently smashing all the music sales records in America (held by Beyonce, Rihanna etc.) by appropriating Black music.

Thus, American Whites are more receptive to European Whites than to African Americans.

Five Eyes and NATO demonstrate that White People have a very strong bond regardless of their location.

The European Union unites White people of many different languages and cultures.

Asian Americans are MORE than welcome back in China. Many of the top celebrities in places like Taiwan, Mainland China and Hong Kong are Asian American or British Asian (I can give you examples).

Asian Americans have family ties back in China, Taiwan, HK etc. There is always a way for them to head back.

I wasn’t trying to imply this, but it seems that I’ve definitely stepped on a landmine here.

Thank you for your kind “clarifications” and civil discourse, but it looks like you are now not only stepping on land mines, but laying down more land mines and stepping on them as well.

the presence of a relatively powerful and globally respected “home” country with the same relative ethnic makeup has helped give its diaspora a certain degree of “clout,” since most Americans who do think in monolithic terms believe that the diaspora have a “base” that’ll go to bat on their behalf.

You have not defined what you are referring to as “clout”, but I will for discussion sake assume that you mean that a “perceived notion that they are some kind of force to be reckoned with”. I can’t argue about how people perceive things, and it certainly possible that some Americans might perceive Chinese Americans and Jewish Americans (or other hyphenated Americans) as having a source of “clout” derived from a foreign sovereignty (whether actually true or not) that somehow gives them power to resist domestic white Anglo hegemony. Where you start to steer off base is in the second half of that statement where you suggest that there is some foreign nation out there which would go to bat on behalf of any of America’s ethnic minorities. However, whether any of those countries actually go to bat for them might not be the main issue as long as there is a perception (from Americans) that foreign countries would somehow come to the aid of marginalized or oppressed ethnic or racial minorities in the USA.

Apparently not only white Americans imagine this sort of perceived clout (possessed by certain designated hyphenated Americans), but black Americans imagine this too.

Black Americans, on the other hand, don’t have that same sort of perceived clout. Most of the African nations are not perceived as being powerful or respected and the ramifications of slavery and how it stripped away any and all traces of tribal or national identity has made it difficult for anyone to link black Americans with any one particular African ethnic group, let alone nation.

There are two landmines that you just placed here as follows:

1. Non-black hyphenated Americans actually have this clout that black Americans do not have

There is nothing further from the truth here. Did Japan come to the aid of the Japanese Americans who were locked up in internment camps? Whatever perceived clout there may be is totally a non-existent thing.

If the USA were to go to war with China (and that possibility has just escalated in the past month (http://www.businessinsider.com/china-is-reportedly-not-afraid-to-fight-a-war-with-the-us-after-south-china-sea-move-2015-10)
you can be rest assured that the target of oppression from BOTH China and the USA would Chinese-Americans. If it ever got to the point that it became so oppressive to Chinese-Americans, they would suddenly become domestic enemies that would be watched, monitored, or locked up, or they would have to flee. But they could not flee to China, who would treat them as running dog traitors from the enemy or at least as unwelcome foreigners. They would probably have to flee to a 3rd location.

I used to participate in some of the race relations rallies when I was a university student, and one of the broken record refrains that I heard over and over again from BLACK students was the whimsical notion that non-black ethnic minority hyphenated Americans have a “homeland” to go back to if they are oppressed in the USA, as if only white Anglo and black Americans do not, but everyone else does. This notion is not only whimsical, but ridiculous to the utmost. They have no more recourse to go back to a “home country” any more than black Americans do. In fact, the opposite may be true (see below).

And for Native Americans, what homeland can they go back to where they can “be among their own people”?

Multiracial Americans – where is their homeland?

2. Being stripped of a perceived connection to a modern nation “homeland” also provides some “clout”

Being associated with a foreign country based on racial or ethnic characteristics can often reduce or diminish the “clout” of a group, even turning it into something decidedly negative. Take the Japanese American Internment example again. Loyal US citizens were locked up and imprisoned as enemies just on the basis of race. There was no foreign sovereignty going to bat for them. If the USA went to war with any African nation, that will never happen to any black American. To a much larger extent, they have more “clout” in asserting their legitimacy as Americans than many of the other ethnically and racially hyphenated American minorities.

Escalated conflict between US and China will greatly reduce the “clout” that any Chinese Americans are somehow perceived to enjoy. BTW, do any Arab Americans enjoy any clout for their perceived connection to the Middle East? There is no clout there.

Jewish Americans have some clout over US foreign policy to Israel and to the Middle East. Asian Americans do not have this clout. But Jews do not have any clout in expecting that Israel will “go to bat for them”.

Native Americans are at the short end of the stick here. They neither have a homeland nor any perceived clout based on a connection or lack of a connection to a homeland.

I guess it’s like the kids on the playground knowing that one particular kid has a big brother that’ll go to bat for him if the bullies try to pick on him.

Except there is no big brother out there to bat for him if the bullies try to pick on him. The kids would have a better chance of scaring off the bullies with a couple of fake karate kicks.

There is some actual empirical observation of the relationship between China and some of the ethnic Chinese diaspora in SE Asia that we can perform.
For example, when Indonesia executed pogroms to expel or kill some of their ethnic Chinese in the 1960s, a few did go to Mainland china (while others fled to Hong Kong, Singapore, or other destinations). In the beginning China accepted a few of them, but later China asked the ethnic Chinese to remain loyal to the countries they resided in.

Malaya is a great example for the USA to ponder about the situation of a multi-racial, multiethnic society that resulted from European colonialism. They had to resolve their conflict by splitting into Malaysia and Singpore.

Now Malaysian Chinese have been increasingly and unwaveringly politically oppressed in recent years. The government has even tried to disenfranchise them at the ballot box. Has China come to their aid? Has even Singapore? Where is that clout derived from some perceived connection to foreign nations coming from?

President Aquino of the Philippines is part Chinese. Do you see China going to the aid of any ethnic Chinese in the Philippines? In fact, they have basically boycotted the Philippines fight to exercise their own sovereignty by taking China to court (ie, the Hague) and decided to disregard any authority that they have.

I know it sounds extremely silly and it discounts the diasporas’ capability and capacity to fight and win their own battles, but that’s how most mainstream Americans think, IMHO.

It not only sounds extremely silly, it is extremely silly. But it seems that not only some “mainstream” Americans hold this whimsical notion, but so do many black Americans. In reality, blacks are in a much better position to fight (but perhaps not win) their own battles. Racialized hyphenated Americans are not in a position to do this at all. Mainstream (and arguably black) American attitudes and oppressive action will turn on a dime if the USA entered conflict with any of the countries or organizations perceived to be affiliated with any of the racialized hyphenated Americans

If you still doubt that, look at the unbridled Islamaphobia in the USA.

@somaliprince relying on the zionists’ success within the american empire does sound a bit like a white american whining about jews in the media and cabinet ‘shtick’ it’s something a little bit off sorry off topic, it’s been one after another the last few weeks

Capital accumulation amongst different desporia is tied to the economic links they have in their home countries.

This is true with Asian immigrants in the U.S. Their is a lot of money that flows back and forth between the U.S. and whatever countries different Asians come from. Some of that money is used to invest in real estate here, some of it is used in import/export business and some of it is used for bussiness start up here in the U.S. Some profits generated here get sent back to their home countries to help suport other family memebers and some of ot is used to invest back into their own country. Some Asians are here temporarily to make money and then plan to retire in places like Singapore because of the lower tax bracket. Thiere is this perception in the U.S. that Asians are “rich”.

Immigrants South of the boarder do much of the same things as Asian immigrants do in regards to money but they are viewed “poor” by Americans generally. Apartment buildings in the San Fernando Valley act as micro communities so for example everyone in one apartment will be from Sonora and another everyone from
Aqua Caliente. The economic difference is their is a lot less money coming in from Mexico to invest in the U.S. but considerably more going out.

The problem that I see is that AA don’t have those kinds of ties with Africa. African immigrants to the U.S. do but not American Blacks.

Where you start to steer off base is in the second half of that statement where you suggest that there is some foreign nation out there which would go to bat on behalf of any of America’s ethnic minorities.

Remember, “perception.” Mainstream Americans perceive the foreign nation as being in the corner of their diaspora, regardless of the reality.

You’ve more than made your point about the diaspora vis-a-vis their “home” nations. But I’ll admit, having my thoughts being picked apart in such a thorough fashion is a bit off-putting.

It not only sounds extremely silly, it is extremely silly. But it seems that not only some “mainstream” Americans hold this whimsical notion, but so do many black Americans. In reality, blacks are in a much better position to fight (but perhaps not win) their own battles. Racialized hyphenated Americans are not in a position to do this at all. Mainstream (and arguably black) American attitudes and oppressive action will turn on a dime if the USA entered conflict with any of the countries or organizations perceived to be affiliated with any of the racialized hyphenated Americans

If you still doubt that, look at the unbridled Islamaphobia in the USA.

Quick question: Do black Americans share the same level of Islamaphobia as their white counterparts and would they if the opportunity presented itself? I myself hold no such views, as I realize our own homegrown terrorists present more of an immediate threat to us.

I don’t want to assume that you think black Americans are no better than their white counterparts when it comes to fear-driven xenophobia, but that’s the kind of vibe I pick up as a look at the above quoted.

@Mack Lyons,
I happen to disagree with Michaeljonbarker. Not 100% disagree, but only about 10-15% agree. If he put your thoughts into words, then I will still have to respectfully disagree with it and insist that your concept is wrong.

@ michaeljonbarker

African immigrants to the U.S. do but not American Blacks.

If I were to make my universe of black Americans = African immigrants like you make the universe of Asian Americans = Asian immigrants, then there would be little difference between the two.

But it sounds like your entire perception of Asian Americans are moneyed recent immigrants, which is largely (not 100%, but largely) wrong. I know that that is the category you often encounter, but it is a false perception as —

– most of them are not even American
– of those that are American, they simply do not at all represent the typical Asian American. The typical Asian American has no real ties to some place in Asia that they can somehow go back to, or get money from, and no one there is going to go to bat for them in the USA either.

This is especially true of the ones who
– trace their origin to pre-1965 immigrants (even including the ones who came after that)
– refugees
– are multiracial or multi-ethnic (ie multiple Asian ancestries)

In fact, it looks like you view Asian Americans as foreigners when you say

I apologize if you felt a bit put off by having your thoughts picked apart. But I was gravely put off by your assertions, and that is why I had to react that way. If you make those assertions again, I might dissect them again piece by piece to try to expose them. It is not anything personal against you, but I must react when people start spreading silly ideas.

Regarding whether blacks are as bad as whites in their xenophobia, I would say it depends. Generally, whites are worse than blacks, but not always.

Re: Islamophobia, I think whites tend to be worse than blacks. Blacks will sense more quickly that some of it is simply racist nativism and more reason to fear domestic terror threats (from non-Muslims) than foreign ones. But I have met a few blacks who picked up the islamophobia as well as some Asian Americans. But a higher percentage of both blacks and Asians will notice the racist element that just goes over the head of most whites.
My Malaysian born Chinese friends, however, tend to revel more in islamophobia, but I think that comes more from the oppression in their birth countries.

However, regarding the broken record refrain that blacks have been stripped of their ties to their ancestral homelands and ethnic groups and cultures and therefore have no access to any sovereign homeland but somehow all the other racialized hyphenated Americans have kept this intact and always have a homeland to go back to, is nothing short of silly. The thing is, I have heard this broken record refrain more from blacks than from whites, and for at least 40 years, so on this note, blacks tend to be even worse than whites. That is NOT fear driven xenophobia but a result lack of awareness of the actual situation as well as some perpetual foreigner stereotypes.

Because, if it were true, why didn’t the Japanese American internees simply just “go home” for protection?

Maybe we need a post on this broken record. I have heard this one more than even some of the ones in Abagond’s broken record list.

In Southern California where I live their is a lot economic depth within various Asian communities. It is true that I work with more upwardly mobile Asians. Some are immigrants and some arennot. Some have been here more then 3 generations and some have not. Some are wealthy and some working class.

It use to be that when different groups came to the U.S. the first thing they would attempt to do is assimilate into the American way of life. That meant loosing their mother tounge and sometimes changing their last names.

Today I see different groups retaining their own culture, language and values and not necessarily embracing American values beyond capitalism.

I have to better understand your argument. I don’t grasp it completly.

“– most of them are not even American
– of those that are American, they simply do not at all represent the typical Asian American. The typical Asian American has no real ties to some place in Asia that they can somehow go back to, or get money from, and no one there is going to go to bat for them in the USA either.

This is especially true of the ones who
– trace their origin to pre-1965 immigrants (even including the ones who came after that)
– refugees
– are multiracial or multi-ethnic (ie multiple Asian ancestries)”

I agree.

“In fact, it looks like you view Asian Americans as foreigners when you say’
This is true with Asian immigrants in the U.S.”

My apologies for that.

In talking about the Asian community in Southern California it is made up of both families that have been here for generations as well as those who have arrived here recently. People here are from everywhere along the Pacific rim and that part of the planet. When I work with Asians I don’t often know where they are from, whether they are Korean, Chinese, Taiwanese ect. nor does it matter to me. It’s what I grew up around and what I’ve always been used too. I’m not comfortable lumping them all together as “Asians” but their communities can overlap and I don’t try to determine distinctions or make assumptions about the people I meet. I also realize my experience is unique to the large Asian communities that I’m doing business with here in L.A. and not typical of the rest of the country where Asians make up a smaller part of the population.

Jefe said:

“I used to participate in some of the race relations rallies when I was a university student, and one of the broken record refrains that I heard over and over again from BLACK students was the whimsical notion that non-black ethnic minority hyphenated Americans have a “homeland” to go back to if they are oppressed in the USA, as if only white Anglo and black Americans do not, but everyone else does.”

Maybe Abagond can do a “broken record” post. I’m not familiar with that.

I think that it can be true but not always true.

For one thing whites can pretty much move anywhere they want and for some of my friends the American dream has become leaving the United States when they retire to find a quite beach somewhere. Capitalism wears you out.

For Mexicans, many work here 30,40 years and eventually go back home to retire. While they are here they are sending money home to by a house, property ect. Their kids here send money back to Mexico and that acts as a kind of social security.

For Jewish people, Israel is always a homeland if where they live becomes anti-Semitic.

I have an Armenian friend who moved here some 40 years ago. He sent considerable monies home to his city which was used to by property which he rented out. When the crash happened, he told me that for the first time he had money being sent to him from Armenia from his rents and it was that money that kept his restaurants afloat here until the economy made somewhat of a comeback.

The same is true for some Nigerian friends I have. Some of the money they make here gets sent home to be invested into business in Nigeria.

For some communities fortunate to have a homeland capital can be more easily accumulated.

Singapore has become the Switzerland of Asia so if things did get ugly here for the Chinese many would go their. It’s not a “homeland” but a viable option.

If the U.S. did get in a war with China or any other Asian nation things would get ugly here. Interment camps and the confiscation of wealth. It would also get ugly for their relatives in China as the government their would see them as spies. That’s a very real scenario if war were to actually occur.

Indeed, I think a post on the topic “Well, at least you all can go back, we can’t”, the broken record refrain that I have heard for decades mostly from blacks, but sometimes from whites, would make a good post topic.

I suspect that Abagond is familiar with the concept and perhaps can imagine what the thinking is for both the sender and receiver of those messages, but I am not sure if feels comfortable expressing it himself.

Maybe I can draft something or work together with him if he is interested. Maybe a post expressing the viewpoint from both perspectives could be done (or one post from the sender’s viewpoint, one from the receiver’s viewpoint).

I have a perspective on that, because I have heard that argument mostly from the receiver viewpoint. I am also one who has left the USA for over 20 years, but in no way did I ever go “back” to anything. If I went back, it would be to the USA, not to any destination outside the USA. I do have ancestors in the USA from before the Revolutionary war for certain, and I strongly suspect that I have ancestors in North America going back for millennia. If that does not demonstrate ties to America, I don’t know what does. YET, I have heard “You can go back, we can’t” all my life, perhaps because every single neighborhood that lived in growing up became hyperblack (80-97%) and this is what I heard coming out of people’s mouths.

On a trip to China with several dozen colleagues I found out exactly how I get mistreated. The group consisted of whites and Asians from multiple ethnic groups (eg, Japanese, Indian) across Asia, as well as HK people, some of whom held HK China travel pass (for people who hold HK SAR passports) and some who traveled on foreign (eg, Canadian, Australian, British passports). Well, when I got to the immigration officer, he forced me to wait in a very slow separate line. I had about 30-40 colleagues wait almost an hour for me while they all sailed through. Well, I noticed something peculiar about the line I was in. They all had Chinese sounding names with US passports. Each was heavily interrogated, including me.

Yet, when I entered the USA, I often had officers accuse me of travelling with a fake passport. Or they heavily interrogate me about WHY I am entering the USA and what my connection to the USA is (Hello, I am an American). I just talked to a black British guy last week and he told me that he often gets accused of traveling with a fake passport too.

But it is indeed a broken record argument that has come up again and again and again on this blog, from both whites and blacks and it just compelled me to express just how silly it is.

You expose the flaw in your reasoning process after acknowledging how the majority of Asians cannot “go back” to “where they came from” and then in the very next breath you talk about all the moneyed people from Asia you work with and who have all this social and monetary capital “back home” to draw from and how that is representative of Asian America.

If the U.S. did get in a war with China or any other Asian nation things would get ugly here. Interment camps and the confiscation of wealth. It would also get ugly for their relatives in China as the government their would see them as spies. That’s a very real scenario if war were to actually occur.

It happened before. I heard about it as a young child during the Cultural revolution from families that escaped and arrived in the USA. Many of the families that were harassed and punished were those that were alleged to have foreign relatives.

So, maybe you really clearly understand — cannot go back if things ever got ugly. It would be both ugly in the USA AND in Asia.

But, you must understand that it would get ugly for the ones (the majority, by the way) who could not “go back” to anywhere in the first place. And seeing that many Americans (both blacks and whites) believe that they could simply go back to somewhere if they wanted to, then we can expect no sympathy from whites or blacks for them if things got ugly.

“You expose the flaw in your reasoning process after acknowledging how the majority of Asians cannot “go back” to “where they came from” and then in the very next breath you talk about all the moneyed people from Asia you work with and who have all this social and monetary capital “back home” to draw from and how that is representative of Asian America.”

Yes I see it now. Thanks for that.

“how that is representative of Asian America.”

Part of it is Asian cultural is really diverse within itself .The Japanese are distinctly different then the Chinese. But I’m not able to distinguish the difference’s here in America from appearances or last names. It seems to me the term “Asian American” is to broad of a term. It just designates what general area on the planet a person is from but not much else. Even if you go with Japanese American or Chinese American all that does is just narrow down the geographical area that a person originated from, it doesn’t tell you about who that person is.

These are my observations and hopefully they don’t come off as stereotypes.

In Los Angeles their are a lot of undocumented people from Asia. Some of them come over in containers through the port of Long Beach. The INS seems to ignore that. Others are “sponsored” by business men here who put them in their sweat shops in the garment district. They work off their travel expense at below minimum wage. Some are sponsored by owners of massage parlors.

Occasionally you will read about a house being raided where pregnant Chinese women are staying so that they can have an “anchor baby” here in the U.S. It was run like a business.

Their are homeless Chinese around China Town and Lincoln Heights where I use to live. They specialize in recyclables.

I looked at a triplex in Lincoln Heights and it had two legal units and one not permitted. It was rented by an extended Asian family and the realtor said they paid the rent in cash. The garage had sewing machines, piles of fabrics and was like a mini sweat shop. Their were boxes of Chinese cigarettes without U.S. stamps on them that I presumed they sold within their community. Self employed working class.

I have also worked for some who live in houses valued over 5 million dollars. They also had extend family living their. That is different then white culture where upward mobility means you get to escape from you mother in law.

Their are many mega churches both Korean and Chinese. What makes them different then their American counterparts is they are more liberal on social issues and don’t find believing in evolution as being a contradiction to their faith. When gay marriage appeared on the ballot in California a few years back Asians and whites voted for it while Black Americans voted overwhelming against it. That tells me that American blacks are more socially conservative then how white society perceives them. Liberal or conservative media attempts to define Black Americans as being very liberal or being very dysfunctional.

When the economy crashed my business was cut by 60% for about 18months. Before the crash one in five of my clients were Asian, after the crash three in five of my clients were Asian. It was like as a community they were insulated from it. They hadn’t over leveraged everything and their incomes were generated within the Asian community. That’s another clue towards capital accumulation. Keeping money spent within your community.

A lot of Koreans work closely with Mexican immigrants and learn to speak Spanish. A Korean contractor will have Mexican workers for general construction and have Korean carpenters do the finish work.

One Korean owned place where I buy equipment at also functions as a kind of bank. Undocumented people don’t have social security numbers and can’t open up bank accounts so check cashing at a lawn mower shop is common. Its where undocumented self employed people can go and get loans.

Their is a large grey economy here in Southern California that both Asian and Hispanic people participate in.

I’ve worked for people who own homes here but don’t have American bank accounts. I’ll get paid from a credit card from Hong Kong. Sometimes I’ll get paid in cash. Some of the real-estate as well as construction here California is financed through Chinese banks. I’ve benefited from that because of the work it created.

So I’m not sure you can define what “Asian American” means beyond a person from Asia with U.S. citizenship. It seems to me that traditional immigrants severed their ties from where they came from. Today people are coming here for different reasons. It could be that because we are more of a “global community” and travel is easier, communication instant, communities are much more inclined to preserve their traditions then abandon them. And that seems to be a big contention in the immigration debate. The idea that people coming here don’t want to “assimilate” into what America is perceived to be.

But I’m not able to distinguish the difference’s here in America from appearances or last names.

That indicates that you really don’t know much about Asian Americans, not only between different ethnic groups, but WITHIN ethnic groups (for example, Chinese Americans with ancestors from Taiwan, SW Guangdong province, Singapore, Vietnam or France or Costa Rica). It also indicates that you have trouble distinguishing between Americans and foreigners.

Imagine if someone said that they cannot distinguish between American born slave descendant blacks, Jamaican descendant and the children of someone from Nigeria, or between mixed and unmixed blacks, or between the ones from Britain and the ones from Mississippi or Haiti.

It seems to me the term “Asian American” is to broad of a term. It just designates what general area on the planet a person is from but not much else.

Yet you still feel you can make blanket statements about Asian Americans.

Even if you go with Japanese American or Chinese American all that does is just narrow down the geographical area that a person originated from, it doesn’t tell you about who that person is.

Do you mean that you cannot tell whether they come from New Jersey or Texas or native to Southern California? Whether or not they went to university or pay their taxes?

So I’m not sure you can define what “Asian American” means beyond a person from Asia with U.S. citizenship.

Sorry, but this is completely wrong. That is not the definition of Asian American.

2/3 of the Japanese American Internees were US citizens. Was it because they were from Asia and somehow acquired US citizenship? NO. It was because they were NOT from Asia but born and raised in the USA. Remember that all people from Asia were “Aliens ineligible for citizenship. You are still using perpetual foreigner tropes. Looks like nothing I say will knock that out of your head.

100 years ago, native US born citizens had to carry ID cards to prove that they were native born US citizens. But ONLY those of ethnic Chinese descent.

Hollywood Actress Anna May Wong was born in Los Angeles in 1905. She was born and raised in the USA and never had ever been to Asia when she was issued this ID card.

That could be the “cultural confusion” I mentioned i thought i had on a different thread in understanding some concepts Kiwi and you were discussing.

.You had posed a series of questions and I never got around to answering them in part because I knew it would open up something that I would have to deal with. A blind spot in how i think.

It’s all good though and I do appreciate your critique.

Part of why I don’t like terms like Asian American or African American is that I think it disempowers the individual. It makes a group part of white supremacy and places that group under American cultural dominence. So to say I am Chinese or I am Black is more empowering then the hyphenated term which dilutes the identity to a subverviant role.

I will familierize myself with the foreign perpetual sterotype. That the other part of the broken record.

For the majority, there is nothing to go back to. We may be able to find some exceptions, but those are exceptions.

But you failed to address the point that many Jewish people did leave Europe before the Second World War.
Indeed, had they not, the holocaust might have been even more devastating. Up to 50% of Jewish people left Germany before the outbreak of the War
(Thus, the option of immigrating is not as far fetched as you make it out to be).

And this was before the notion that modern states could commit Genocide on an industrial scale became a reality.

Regardless, I accept your point. Were the Chinese and the Americans to go to war, many Chinese Americans would follow the same fate as the Japanese.

After all, I am not an idealist.

That said, it does not disprove the Trojan-Horse argument I was making. Many of the top academics and scientists currently working in China studied in the US.

In other words, China has successfully siphoned intellectual capital away from America. This is something that Africa has been far less successful at doing.
The question is, why?
The answer reduces itself to the discussion @Jefe and @MackLyons have been having. I will get to that.

@v8driver

relying on the zionists’ success within the american empire does sound a bit like a white american whining about jews in the media and cabinet ‘shtick’ it’s something a little bit off sorry off topic, it’s been one after another the last few weeks

I didn’t quite understand your sentence, can you clarify? Sorry, I don’t think I am reading it right and I wouldn’t want to misinterpret your words.

@MJB

The problem that I see is that AA don’t have those kinds of ties with Africa. African immigrants to the U.S. do but not American Blacks.

Yes I agree. I think you pretty much summarised the discussion for everyone pretty well with that sentence.

But there is no reason why that cannot start. Thus, I commence my next post.

I honestly think that everyone has been ignoring the Elephant in the Room.

@MJB and @MackLyons have tried to occupy the centre ground.

@Jefe has knocked them all down with a dose of pessimism that basically reduces to: ‘Once you have left your homeland, you’re f*cked.’

Thus the Elephant in the Room.

How have White People been able to do it?

New Zealand, Australia, Canada, the US and the EU all have some sort of military/intelligence alliance. The exchange of people and ideas between these entities is pretty common.

Not only in entertainment, but in universities, in business, in trading agreements etc.

Their ties are as strong as ever.

Whites from South Africa have been gradually heading back to ‘White’ territory. Whites from Zimbabwe have been gradually heading back to ‘White’ territory. Whites from all over the world usually have an escape route.

I personally believe that China is gradually building up a similar block.

Not only are a lot of ABCs heading back to China (I’ll find the statistics) but China’s sphere is growing.

Not only are relations with Taiwan starting to unfreeze, but the Mandarin speaking sphere also encompasses groups in Singapore, Malaysia and, of course, many European and American cities.

Hong Kong is reluctantly coming to terms with the fact that it now is part of Mandarin China.

I have lived there. You have lived there. More and more people are going to live and work in China.

I say this knowing that @Jefe will shoot me down, but I find the pessimism somewhat unbearable.

In other words, we are forever destined to live under White hegemony?

And that acquiring capital, building up knowledge, will lead to nowhere?

I think the better question to ask @Jefe is:

(and this is always a good question to ask a pessimist)

What solutions do you propose?

Asking for reparations and hoping that Whites will gradually treat Blacks better?

My position hasn’t really changed, as long as the Empire is White and Blacks don’t have sufficient leverage to extract what they want, things will continue as they are or even worsen.

“That indicates that you really don’t know much about Asian Americans, not only between different ethnic groups, but WITHIN ethnic groups (for example, Chinese Americans with ancestors from Taiwan, SW Guangdong province, Singapore, Vietnam or France or Costa Rica). It also indicates that you have trouble distinguishing between Americans and foreigners.

Imagine if someone said that they cannot distinguish between American born slave descendant blacks, Jamaican descendant and the children of someone from Nigeria, or between mixed and unmixed blacks, or between the ones from Britain and the ones from Mississippi or Haiti.”

So, White People, regardless of the fact that they are usually the descendants of people from different countries, all get to be grouped up as White (and benefit from the same White Privilege), whilst all other non-White people have to be chopped up into their smallest possible denomination?

So we distinguish them until unity is no longer possible? Until everyone is too different, except for White People?

Honestly, @Jefe, I think you underestimate the unity there is among Chinese people (whether they be ABC or China-born) and the possible unity there could be amongst Black people.

Regardless of where they came from, China is a country as large as the European Union with a population much larger than the European Union.

They have not fragmented into dozens of different countries like the European Union has.

And, as the West becomes poorer, and China becomes richer, more and more will begin to migrate back.

I studied Chinese in China, the majority of my classmates were ABCs who, due to China’s rise, had decided to start learning Chinese (which they never learned whilst young) in order to keep the option of returning to China open.

As China becomes a consumption-led economy with a thriving high-skilled services sector, the demand for people with more ‘creative’ skills will increase, precisely the type of graduates produced by American universities.

The Chinese, right now, are planning to reform their notorious gaokao (高考) system in order to produce new waves of students more suited to a modern economy.

But it will be a while before they catch up.

It is not that difficult to migrate to China. Most of the time, you just need 2-3 years work experience. If you have a good level of Chinese (HSK level 3 and up), you get fast tracked.

You should draft a post for “You can go back, we can’t” and then maybe I could offer suggestions if necessary. You could do a way better job than I could, especially since you have “gone back” and know first-hand how untrue it is.

You seem to be arguing that empires are by nature racist or at least ethno-chauvinist. Amy Chua (I have a post on her) argues the opposite: racism is what doomed Nazi Germany, while openness to immigration in the US after 1965 is what saved it. In both cases their openness or lack thereof determined the direction of the ensuing brain drain and, therefore, long-term military superiority.

The most successful empires are cosmopolitan. Therefore, If I remember correctly, she does not think China will be the next empire because it is too ethnically closed off.

I agree with Kiwi: you say racism is for inferior minds and yet you have bought into much of its thinking. You pose as a cosmopolitan yet much of your thinking seems to be rationalized redneckism.

You seem to be arguing that empires are by nature racist or at least ethno-chauvinist. Amy Chua (I have a post on her) argues the opposite: racism is what doomed Nazi Germany, while openness to immigration in the US after 1965 is what saved it. In both cases their openness or lack thereof determined the direction of the ensuing brain drain and, therefore, long-term military superiority.

The most successful empires are cosmopolitan. Therefore, If I remember correctly, she does not think China will be the next empire because it is too ethnically closed off.

I agree with Kiwi: you say racism is for inferior minds and yet you have bought into much of its thinking. You pose as a cosmopolitan yet much of your thinking seems to be rationalized redneckism.

Finally someone has taken the time to capture what I am saying. I am moving my website, so the Laws are no longer posted.

My basic argument is that Racism/Xenophobia (on the whole) is what causes Empires to fall.

Law 8: Racism belongs to inferior minds. It equates to underestimating your enemy.

Law 9: Never underestimate your enemy.

An Empire that does not break these Laws has a longer chance of surviving.

An Empire that becomes obsessed with its own superiority eventually becomes too arrogant and pride always comes before the fall.

As happened with the Nazis.

So I am on the side of Amy Chua (I will read your post).

America is currently moving into Nazi territory and will therefore fall.

The reason why my argument appeared ‘redneck-y’ is because I argue that ALL Empires eventually fall into this trap.

ALL Empires eventually become racist. One of the last acts of the Ottoman Empire was the genocide of the Armenians.

The British became Jingo-ists (‘Britannia rules the waves’) and then what happened?

Rome, for instance, was eventually run over by the very barbarians it deemed inferior.

The current White Empire has committed the same sins as previous Empires, it will therefore, also, eventually fall.

To be replaced by an Empire built by the very people it deemed inferior (first the Chinese, then the Africans).

I believe that Africa, in a few centuries, will become the World’s centre.

I have statistics and data to back this up that I will post on my (new) website.

But on the whole, is what I am arguing making sense?

I believe in historial patterns. In stages that all Empires go through. Empires can make choices that determine their survival. Empires that make the wrong choices (racism) fall.

@Kiwi, now does it make sense?

@Abagond, thank you for providing a bridge between me and Kiwi. We hit a dead end.

You should draft a post for “You can go back, we can’t” and then maybe I could offer suggestions if necessary. You could do a way better job than I could, especially since you have “gone back” and know first-hand how untrue it is.

First of all, I would like to know if people acknowledge it as a “broken record argument”. I have heard it repeatedly since I was a teenager and see it over and over again on this blog.

I am not sure what you mean by “how untrue it is”. My point is more along the lines of it being a vacuous argument. For most, it is not a matter of going back to anywhere. Black Americans can go anywhere that Asian Americans go or white Americans go. They just don’t do it at any noticeable scale.

“That indicates that you really don’t know much about Asian Americans, not only between different ethnic groups, but WITHIN ethnic groups (for example, Chinese Americans with ancestors from Taiwan, SW Guangdong province, Singapore, Vietnam or France or Costa Rica). It also indicates that you have trouble distinguishing between Americans and foreigners.”

That’s generally true about myself. I have a general understanding of the history of that part of the world but don’t know the specifics about different ethnic groups.

The thing is when I work for someone who could be Chinese or Korean I don’t try to assume I can tell the difference based on looks or last name.

“It also indicates that you have trouble distinguishing between Americans and foreigners.”

Part of that comes from my philosophical anarchism. I’m an open boarder guy. Freedom of movement is a basic human right. I will always argue from an anti state position. So that means I’m against empires so therefor I’m anti-American. It also means that when I argue from a position of inalienable rights it creates a kind of color blindness so I have to be aware of that. I don’t believe in the concept of foreigners.

“Yet you still feel you can make blanket statements about Asian Americans.”

Yes and no. In writing what I wrote I understood that I was making generalizations. The first part was about what I was seeing that you don’t read about in the news. Homeless Asians, the number here illegally and their interaction with Hispanics.

When I said that I believe they are more socially liberal that was based on exit polling. I will grant that my statement that Asian Christians aren’t as radical as their American counterparts as speculative.

“So I’m not sure you can define what “Asian American” means beyond a person from Asia with U.S. citizenship.”

Yes that my opinion based on my philosophy but that isn’t meant to take away from the historical reality of how Asians are perceived in the U.S. both today and in U.S. history.

By hyphenating groups within the U.S. it creates the illusion that their is a kind of equality between them and regular white Americans.

I said “So to say I am Chinese or I am Black is more empowering then the hyphenated term which dilutes the identity to a subservient role.”

You said:

“So what should white people do? they can continue to be just “white”?”

“I can tell you, most white people I met HATE to be called something like “white Anglo”.

Our friend Mirkwood defines himself as “Irish American”. Whites are the ruling tribes of the current empire so they can define themselves from whatever white ethnic background they come from.

So in order to withstand white supremacy groups need to retain both their cultural and racial identity separate from the ruling hegemony in order to retain both their identity and to accumulate economic strength to counter balance the white supremacy stranglehold on the planet.

This idea that we have “diversity” in society is a deflection and helps maintain white cultural dominance by creating the illusion that we have equality and justice, that we live in a post racial world, that each person is treated as a unique individual. Inclusion (being valued, respected and supported) can only happen within specific groups that maintain a strong identity. It can’t happen in an empire where the ruling tribe holds both cultural and economic dominance over others.

“My construct is based on Natural Rights. I can’t “prove” Natural Rights exist,
I just assume they do the same way a theist assumes God exists.”

You responded

“The assumption that humans have inalienable rights is precisely the idea that the Empire has forced upon us.”

That’s true. But their is a reason for that I will get too in a minute. What’s interesting is that you can read the constitutions from both Capitalist and Communist countries and they read very similarity with flowerily language lauding the rights of individuals. In practice though we see that constitutions do very little to actually follow through and protect all individuals. Apparently some people are more equal then others regardless of what the documents say.

“You discard the Constitution, yet you quote directly from it.”

“You believe all humans have inalienable rights, but when those rights are violated, who do you appeal to?”

“the Empire.”

“So the authority on your rights is the Empire?”

“Who else would you appeal to?”

The current justice system throughout the planet helps maintain white supremacy. Traditionally justice was meant to make whole the victim of an aggression or in the case of theft insure that restitution was made to those whose property had been stolen. Todays system makes the State the victim and it is designed to perpetuate the power of the State; It is not designed to correct injustice.

Inalienable rights are ones we are born with, they cannot be taken or given away. When you take these rights and put them on paper and give the authority to “protect” these rights to the State that means it is up to the State in how they are interpreted and to who they are applied.

We need a revolution within the justice system and return it to the locale community.

Is your definition of African American as someone from Africa with US citizenship?
Is your definition of European (white) American as someone from Europe with US citizenship?
Is your definition of Latino American as someone from Latin America with US citizenship?
Is your definition of Native American as someone from a Native place with US citizenship? (or a Cherokee American is someone from a sovereign Cherokee reservation with US citizenship?)
What is your definition of Arab American?

I am afraid to ask you where multiracial Americans come from, but I do know that Tiger Woods is from Cablinasia.

@somaliprince uhh… mild ribbing… you are kind of in your burnin or jump in phase lol…
Ppl have been positing if you’re white, you may have noticed. Also, we have been going way off topic; usually you pick something else ie relative to your worldview theory propositions? Proselytization of your 11 immutable laws? Like the simpsons, abagond has done it all (pretty much).

I am glad you chose to reply to that comment. I thought it had been lost in all the other discussions.

@Abagond, I hope you won’t mind the slight digression, it is worthy of debate. As you may have noticed, I have also toned down the whole ‘Game of Empires’ thing so I hope you can afford me this luxury.

Back to @MJB

I also read your most recent comment and gathered that you adhere to the anarchist stream of thought (a stream of thought that, when well understood, also has its merits).

When it comes to the State of Nature, I am of the Hobbesian persuasion, and therefore believe that it would lead to a ‘war against all’, thus the need for an entity to defend those who identify as ‘one tribe’.

The current justice system throughout the planet helps maintain white supremacy.

I agree. I believe that white supremacy, or privilege, actually extends far beyond ‘white lands’. Having lived in China, I noticed the courtesies white men were afforded that, I, was not.

Traditionally justice was meant to make whole the victim of an aggression or in the case of theft insure that restitution was made to those whose property had been stolen. Todays system makes the State the victim and it is designed to perpetuate the power of the State; It is not designed to correct injustice.

Agreed.

Inalienable rights are ones we are born with, they cannot be taken or given away. When you take these rights and put them on paper and give the authority to “protect” these rights to the State that means it is up to the State in how they are interpreted and to who they are applied.

It is here that I disagree somewhat. I do not believe in inalienable rights. Perhaps it is my mindset but I tend to look at the poor and at the downtrodden and wonder to myself, where are there rights?

Inalienable means that they form a core part of that person and cannot be removed

But yet, they are often so easily and routinely taken away from so many worldwide, it almost makes a mockery of the term.

I subscribe to the realist school of thought defined by: Political Groupism (tribalism), Egoism, International Anarchy and Power Politics.

If you are to have rights, then you must fight for them. In that sense, only the entity that you create can protect them.

It is my belief that all tribes – I have decided not to use the words ‘race’ or ‘ethnicity’ – form to create this entity.

This happens at the birth of that tribes’ ethnogenesis. Thus, when the English became English, England became England. When (White) Americans became (White) Americans, America became America. When Rome became Rome, Romans became Romans

From then on, it becomes next to impossible to dissociate that entity (the state, or Empire) from the tribe.

The state was only designed to guarantee the rights of the tribe in question, not of anyone else’s.

The desire to survive of the tribe creates a state of constant suspicion of rival groups.

I previously called this racism, perhaps I should have called it tribalism.

Yet, in order for the tribe to grow (to further protect the original tribe), it must eventually subsume other groups.

It is at this point that the state must decide carefully. The original tribe might feel threatened by the interests of new tribes. Thus a hierarchy is created.

Romans may have had citizenship as a means to protect the original tribe. Americans may have had skin colour as a means to protect the original tribe.

As Abagond has highlighted, the tribes that grow to be the most succesful are those that are accepting of new groups.

In order for the original tribe to maintain its dominant position, it creates myths around itself to further guarantee its superior rights.

The current hegemonic tribe (whites) claims that it is ‘the cultural descendant of Ancient Antiquity’.

The Han Chinese believe themselves to be descendents of the Yellow Emperor.

The original Roman tribe claimed to be descendants of Romulus and Remus.

Thus, rights become hierarchical. They become dependent on the tribe you belong to. The ‘original’ tribe has more rights than the ‘other’ tribe.

I believe that America currently finds itself in such a state.

In other words, the American state must learn to dissociate itself from the ‘original’ tribe and all its other associations with skin colour.

As current events highlight (the police force being the best example), the ‘establishment’ and colour still appear to be intrinsically linked.

We need a revolution within the justice system and return it to the locale community.

I agree that if rights were tied to the individual, and that if they were mutually respected, a return to the locale community would be ideal. But how you would guarantee that some individuals do not infringe on the rights of other individuals?

In other words, how do you avoid a ‘war of all against all’, as Hobbes would put it. Do you rely of the innate goodness of human beings? Would you, therefore, align yourself more with Locke’s view of human nature?

Sorry if this is a duplicate comment, @somaliprince call it mild ribbing, you are in your burn-in or ‘jump in’ phase. Serious questions about your idenyity have been raised, and it’s been posited you are potentially white!
Also most of us here love writing, and i personally can appreciate your zeal in proseltyzing you 11 rules of hegemony and so forth, also you can typically pick a relevant thread? I should write a bit on netiquette but i never will

What does Latin American music mean exactly ? Or food ? Latin culture is too diverse to make those terms meaningful.

But we see these terms used by the State and in schools. What it does is attack identity, blur it and attempt white wash or Americanize groups of people. It’s part of cultural appropriation. I see these terms as being used within white supremecy to define these communities in the way America wishes to percieve itself.

Serious questions about your idenyity have been raised, and it’s been posited you are potentially white!

Yes I had noticed. As a person self-admittedly born into wealth, I was perhaps afforded a somewhat unusual education. I was sent to boarding school at a relatively young age in the UK, and subsequently completed my university studies there. I then returned to Somalia for a few years to start a family.

Things eventually took a turn for the worse, thus my now ‘nomadic’ status.

But this was all quite a few years ago now.

I should write a bit on netiquette but i never will

I have indeed somewhat strayed off topic in a few instances. Abagond has now created the relevant post.

Do you realize that you just made two different statements that have inherent contradiction. (By the way, I agree with the first sentence, but not the second.)

Can you accept that that is NOT the definition of Asian American?Most Asian Americans who are US citizens are not from Asia at all.

If this is still confusing for you, let’s consider a scenario.

Let’s suppose, (for discussion purposes – the actual figures are not really THAT important) among the Asians in the USA
A. 38% were born in the USA
B. 56% were born in some Asian country
C. 6% were born in some non-Asian country outside the US (eg, a Peruvian of Japanese descent, an Indian Guyanese, a French Vietnamese or Canadian born Chinese).

All of A are US citizens because of the 14th Amendment and US v. Wong Kim Ark (1898) or automatically so when Hawaii became a state. Assume 1/2 of B. and 2/3 of C have become naturalized US citizens.

That would translate into
– Only 28% of the Asians in the USA would be “a person from Asia with US citizenship”
– 70% of the Asians in the USA would be Americans, of which 28% were from Asia, or about 40% of Asian Americans.
–> It should be very clear from the above example that the majority of Asian-Americans are not from Asia. Unless there are some new ethnic groups from Asia that only started arriving to the US in the past 2 decades, this is generally true for all Asian American groups,even those who have come to the US post 1965, even the Koreans and Vietnamese. It is DEFINITELY true for the groups that had large numbers enter the US before 1965 (ie, Chinese, Japanese, Filipinos). If you went to Hawaii, hardly any Asian Americans are actually from Asia.

In addition, there are a number of non-Asian Americans with US citizenship born in Asia. I personally know several dozen “white” Americans (friends, ex-colleagues) who gave birth to their children in Asia – there are at least tens of thousands of them. Their kids fit the definition of “a person from Asia with U.S. citizenship” but they are in no context classified as Asian American.

I hope that there is some hope to debunk the myth in your mind that most Asian Americans are foreigners or from Asia. The perpetual foreigner stereotype went right over your head.

She is the third generation to be born in America. Her father is half Japanese and half Filipino (Cebuano). Her mother is half Chinese and half Filipina (Tagalog).

That makes her a quarter Japanese, a quarter Chinese, and half Filipina (from two different tribes/ethnolinguistic nations).

She isn’t Japanese American. She isn’t Chinese American. She isn’t Filipino American.

Asian American is the only term broad enough to encompass her heritage.

She doesn’t speak Japanese, Chinese, Cebuano, or Tagalog. Neither do her parents. She’s never been to Japan, China, or the Philippines. Neither have her parents.

She isn’t an aberration. There are increasing numbers of Asian Americans like her. In Hawaii, she is the norm.

This is no different from someone who is a quarter Russian, a quarter French, a quarter Welsh, and a quarter Scots (i.e., half Celtic British). White Americans don’t tend to see anything odd or unusual about someone with mixed European ancestry but often have trouble conceiving of somebody like her.

You apparently know and work with a lot of Asians who are either foreign nationals, recent immigrants, or American-born children heavily involved in their family’s international business.

You don’t seem to know a lot of Asian Americans who are third, fourth, fifth generation, or who are teachers, accountants, lawyers, ministers, soldiers, actors, police officers, coaches, musicians, and college professors. Which is interesting, because in southern California you’re surrounded by them.

Wikipedia defines “Asian American” this way: “Asian Americans are Americans of Asian descent. The U.S. Census Bureau definition of Asians refers to a person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent. It includes people who indicated their race(s) as “Asian”.

It is this that perpetuates the idea of perpetual foreigner.

I’m arguing that I dislike it for a number of reasons.

I used the description “Asian communities” in my above commentaries because it is broad enough to include those who are born in the U.S. and those who are not and those who have interracial families made of those within those communities.

I aslo said “I’m not comfortable lumping them all together as “Asians” .

I also said “In talking about the Asian community in Southern California it is made up of both families that have been here for generations as well as those who have arrived here recently. People here are from everywhere along the Pacific rim and that part of the planet.”

I also said “I’m not comfortable lumping them all together as “Asians”.”

I also said “Asian cultural is really diverse within itself.”

So when I said “So I’m not sure you can define what “Asian American” means beyond a person from Asia with U.S. citizenship.” I’m referring to the Wikipedia definition that Americans created and use to describe what the government created in order to keep track of and manage peoples who are considered not American or non white. I’m not saying that I prescribe to it as I avoid using it myself.

I also said “But I’m not able to distinguish the difference’s here in America from appearances or last names. ”

I’m comfortable with that. I’m not going to try to make assumptions about people I don’t know based on what their race appears to look like or what their last names are.

Jefe said “Yet you still feel you can make blanket statements about Asian Americans”.

I have made generalizations about what I see some “Asians” doing. Their are not meant to collectivize entire communities nor do they take into account other mitigating factors.

A number of years a go I had a conversation with a Japanese friend who told me the word she hated the most in English is “Asian”. I never forgot that and have tried to avoid using it.

I also said “Part of why I don’t like terms like Asian American or African American is that I think it disempowers the individual. It makes a group part of white supremacy and places that group under American cultural dominance. So to say I am Chinese or I am Black is more empowering then the hyphenated term which dilutes the identity to a subservient role.”

I also said I didn’t believe in the concept of foreigner. I don’t believe that arbitrary lines on the planet determine human value.

You said “Can you accept that that is NOT the definition of Asian American?
Most Asian Americans who are US citizens are not from Asia at all.”

Of course I accept that. That’s the point I’ve been trying to make.

Solitaire said:

“Let me give you an example of someone I know in real life.”

“She is the third generation to be born in America. Her father is half Japanese and half Filipino (Cebuano). Her mother is half Chinese and half Filipina (Tagalog).”

“That makes her a quarter Japanese, a quarter Chinese, and half Filipina (from two different tribes/ethnolinguistic nations).”

“Asian American is the only term broad enough to encompass her heritage.”

That definition makes sense and I don’t have a problem with how individuals wish to identify themselves. It is how individuals wish to identify themselves that important and should be respected.

I have Navaho friends who only wish to be identified as Navaho. They don’t want “American” part of their identity.

It’s not of the governments business to go about racially classifying a society. Sometimes it is meant for good but usually it ends up leading to State violence targeted at specific communities.

Solitare said,

“You don’t seem to know a lot of Asian Americans who are third, fourth, fifth generation, or who are teachers, accountants, lawyers, ministers, soldiers, actors, police officers, coaches, musicians, and college professors. Which is interesting, because in southern California you’re surrounded by them.”

I do. It’s just when I have conversations with them that they don’t refer to themselves as Asian Americans. The only time I see terms like (whatever race)/American is in the media or in print. When people tell you about themselves they will say things like my father was Chinese but my mother is Vietnamese. If they so “originally from” that means their parents were often times born their but not always. Their parents may have moved to Canada first.
I’ve never met a Black person who referred to themselves as “African American”. You will see it in print and it is used respectfully to introduce a prominent Black person. You will see “Black on Black” crime but you never see “African American community riots” but rather “Black community riots”. You don’t see “African American” on African American crime”. The reasons for that is Americans don’t riot and white Americans aren’t seen as criminal and thugs. So the media selective use words to set a narrative

Abagond. I posted up a response. But it vanished. I suspect it might be in moderation but the usual flag the poster gets doesn’t pop up anymore. That Happened on another thread. I thought I had lost it and then it appeared later.

Wikipedia defines “Asian American” this way: “Asian Americans are Americans of Asian descent. The U.S. Census Bureau definition of Asians refers to a person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent. It includes people who indicated their race(s) as “Asian”.

yet you said

“Asian American” means … a person from Asia with U.S. citizenship.”

However, NONE of these definitions means that the relevant person is from Asia, no more than the definition of “black” by the US census bureau when it refers to a person having origins in any of the original peoples of “sub-saharan” Africa.

It is obvious that the whole discussion just goes “WHOOSH” over your head and I have no idea what to do about it.

It’s not of the governments business to go about racially classifying a society.

Yep, but they are forced to so, at least in the US (and a few other countries that come to mind).

The term “Asian” in the USA is a political term from the 1970s to replace the older terms like “Oriental” (which were used in context similar to “Colored”) and the Jim Crow terms of Mongolian and Malay (which were mentioned in context with the term “Negro”).

If you oppose the term “African American” but like the term “Black”, and dislike the term “Asian American” as well, then what do you propose that Asian Americans use? “Yellow”? As Solitaire pointed out to you, terms like “Chinese”, “Japanese” and “Filipino” just don’t cut it.

You said, “I’m referring to the Wikipedia definition that Americans created and use to describe what the government created in order to keep track of and manage peoples who are considered not American or non white.”

I don’t know as much about this as I believe Jefe does, so I’d appreciate any input he has. But to the best of my knowledge, the term “Asian American” was not created by the US government. From what I understand, Americans of Asian descent fought long and hard to get this term adopted to replace other terms they found inaccurate and/or offensive.

I understand a lot of what you’re saying about why you personally have trouble with the term. But I don’t know that you as a white person get to decide for Asian Americans that they shouldn’t use it, especially when that’s the community who fought for its adoption in the first place.

You said, “It’s just when I have conversations with them that they don’t refer to themselves as Asian Americans.”

Whereas I know many who identify as Asian American. Sure, in a personal conversation about origins, they will go into detail. But they also name their own organizations things like the Asian American Student Association and celebrate Asian American History Month and wear t-shirts that say Asian American Pride.

Something else I think you’re missing here is that Americans of Asian descent have been using “Asian American” as a way to promote cohesiveness within their highly diverse community because they recognized that they needed to band together to have any sort of political impact on issues that affect them as a race.

There’s always going to be someone within a group, like your Japanese (meaning what? American or visiting from Japan or ?) friend, who doesn’t like the term most often used to describe their group. But that doesn’t mean they’re necessarily in the majority. It’s good to respect that individual’s wishes, and it’s good to be careful of using that same word with others until you know how they personally feel about being referred to as such. It’s altogether different to argue extensively with someone who is Asian American (Jefe) that he shouldn’t prefer the term.

You said, “I’ve never met a Black person who referred to themselves as “African American”. ”

Good lord. Seriously? I hear this constantly. I’ve met tons of people who refer to themselves as African American, refer to their family and friends as African American, who talk about “the African American community,” etc.

Also, it’s been my experience that some minority members will refer to themselves casually one way within their community or even with close friends of other races but strongly prefer a different term from strangers, acquaintances, the general public, etc. I know quite a few African Americans who will use the term “black” casually but not in public discourse. I know quite a few Native Americans who privately use the term “Indian” but who will take great offense if a stranger calls them that. They may use it among themselves, but they don’t want to see it on a census form.

Also, when I said, “You don’t seem to know a lot of Asian Americans who are third, fourth, fifth generation, or who are teachers, accountants, lawyers, ministers, soldiers, actors, police officers, coaches, musicians, and college professors”: This was meant in context with the earlier discussion about whether Asian Americans could use their countries of origin as a fallback or a big brother. I made that statement because of the types of people you used as examples to argue that Asian Americans have close ties with their homelands.

So I apologize, I was mistaken and you do know people like this. Then I have this question. Do the American-born Asians you know who are, say, elementary school teachers or social workers–do these people all have extensive contacts with and financial ties to their countries of origin? Because in my experience, they don’t. They’re Americans first, before anything else, and their entire life is centered and focused here.

“Do the American-born Asians you know who are, say, elementary school teachers or social workers–do these people all have extensive contacts with and financial ties to their countries of origin?”

It depends upon whether they families came here over 50 years ago or whether they came here within the last few generations. I would say that their family ties are less then other communities because of Asians long history here in the U.S. and the distance between continents. But the young generation keeps their language and their families maintain their ties back to their homelands and I think this is a shift away from how Immigrants first assimilated here in the U.S.

I know Mexican families who have been here for more then four generations and still travel back to Mexico to visit their relatives. Due to the proximity of the U.S. to Mexico it’s a lot easier to maintain family ties.

I have an Armenian friend who has a dealership that specializes in second hand jeeps and renovates them for Off Road. I’ve bought two jeeps from him over the last couple of years. About a month ago he and his 74 family relatives all flew back to Armenia for a family reunion. The Family ties within the Armenian community are strong. Some identify more strongly as American and others more strongly as Armenian. After the Armenian genocide their diaspora dispersed everywhere. So some identify as Russian, some as Syrian, Lebanese ect some as Arab Armenian and some as Persian Armenian.

My son is dating a girl who’s mother is from San Salvador and her father from Jordan. She’s tri lingual and can identify as either Arab American or Hispanic American.

I have met plenty of people who have immigrated here that think America is the best. One guy I know sells drinking straws to some major fast food outlets here in Southern California. He sells like 50,000,000 straws a year. lol

It could be we hang out in different social circles. I have conversations with Asian Americans but the issue of race rarely comes up. It does come up when I have conversations with people who are Black, Mexican, Central American, Armenian ect. It could be because I can more easily point to a story in the media that they can identify with.

“But I don’t know that you as a white person get to decide for Asian Americans that they shouldn’t use it, especially when that’s the community who fought for its adoption in the first place.”

I’m not trying to decide for anybody how they want to identify as. I also am cautious not to assume I know what that person wishes to be identified as. Characterizing people as stereotypes contradicts the reality of who people are. I’m just questioning the boxes Americans like to put people in. If I have offended anybody my apologies.

Thank you for showing MJB his constant use of the
– perpetual foreigner stereotype
– “Some of my best friends are black” trope (and using the “Some of my best friends are Asian” corollary trope) which mints him as a certified expert.

But to the best of my knowledge, the term “Asian American” was not created by the US government. From what I understand, Americans of Asian descent fought long and hard to get this term adopted to replace other terms they found inaccurate and/or offensive.

“Asian” was indeed a term ratified and designated by the US government in the late 70s, but after Americans (starting with University students) of different Asian backgrounds banded together during and after the 60s-70s civil rights era to address some of the shared issues that they faced, such as problems with the old Jim Crow terms, immigration and racist laws, Yellowface, as well as dehumanization during the Vietnam War, so it was in response to some of the pressure from different Asian groups. “Asian” was promoted at that time as a term of strength, similar to how “black” was promoted.

In 1970, one of my cousins became THE poster child on the US government poster that had 4 kids with “Black is Beautiful” “White is Beautiful” “Yellow is Beautiful” and “Red is Beautiful”. I will look for that. That was the only incident where I recall the government using “yellow” and “red”.

My first summer & winter temp job was at the US Census Bureau in Suitland, MD in 1980. That census was the FIRST census that “Asian” was used and the LAST Census where “Oriental” occurred. In Jan 1980, I worked in the department that printed the forms, so I was watching them come off the press.
I also remember my university application forms, which had both “Oriental” and “Asian” appearing on the forms in the late 1970s.

The term “Asian” gained credence and acceptance among the general US Asian population after the Vincent Chin slaying (1982) (and the term “Oriental” dropped out of use).
Prior to 1970, there was no pan-Asian official designation. They referred to individual ethnic groups (Chinese, Japanese, Filipino). Before 1975, there were no “Asian” Student clubs or organizations anywhere. “Asian American Heritage week” did not appear until 1979. I had a close connection to the latter event.

Sounds like MJB wants us to go back to the pre-civil rights period or back to the Jim Crow era, when whites decided what Asians should be called.

I know that I’ve been seeing for the last 20-25 years an effort to distinguish between Asian and Asian American, so that Asian would refer to tourists, international students, etc. while Asian American would be citizens (natural-born or not) and immigrants working towards citizenship or permanent residency. Yet another attempt to correct the perpetual foreigner stereotype, although it’s an uphill battle.

I would be interested in reading about your connection with the first Asian American Heritage Week.

I think some of the confusion here is arising from MJB’s leanings towards anarchy and resistance to labels, which I can sympathize with–but which in this specific case seems to be veering dangerously towards “I don’t see color” territory.

“But the young generation keeps their language and their families maintain their ties back to their homelands and I think this is a shift away from how Immigrants first assimilated here in the U.S.”

Not all of them, though. Not by any stretch. That’s where I’m having big problems. You’re saying that there’s been this shift in how much assimilation is happening and that Asian Americans retain the language and the family ties overseas as if it’s an all-encompassing thing. Sure, I know people like that. But I know many others who aren’t, and the more generations they’re in America, the less likely they are to speak their ancestors’ language(s) or retain ties in the old country.

And I also tend to think the argument of “immigrants used to assimilate immediately, now they don’t” is a fallacious one. Read any of the books or government reports written about European immigrants in the late 1800s/early 1900s and you’ll find plenty of references to children having to translate for their parents, people who’ve been in the US for thirty years without learning English, huge ethnic enclaves of Irish, Italian, Poles, Russians, Jews, etc. in the large cities where one can walk for blocks without hearing English or seeing a store sign in English. There were Europeans smuggling illegal immigrants in or running “paper son” scams. There were many young men who came for a few years, made money, and went back home. Many others stayed for life but continued to send money to their extended family in Europe.

And this one is a personal ancedote, but in my tiny Midwestern hometown when I was a child, there were elderly people who were third and fourth generation Americans but who could speak fluent German and who remembered that the town had a German-language newspaper and church services in German until the start of the First World War.

You wrote,

“It could be we hang out in different social circles. I have conversations with Asian Americans but the issue of race rarely comes up.”

Well, I think that may be part of it, although I certainly do know Asian Americans of the type you describe, with the close ties and recent immigration history and so forth. My spouse works in a diversity-related field, so race is a huge facet of his job and the issue comes up constantly whenever I’m around his colleagues and his students, as well as how race intersects with gender, LGBTQ, disability, etc.

You wrote:

“I have met plenty of people who have immigrated here that think America is the best.”

Um, was this meant as a response to my statement: “They’re Americans first, before anything else, and their entire life is centered and focused here.”???

“Also, refugee populations are forced to cut off “home country ties” almost immediately.”

It is not always forever. Think Viet Nam or San Salvador.

“which mints him as a certified expert.”

I’m not claiming that at all. “Asian” is a racialized term that describes billions of people who are very diverse.

“Sounds like MJB wants us to go back to the pre-civil rights period or back to the Jim Crow era, when whites decided what Asians should be called.”

Nope. Individuals should be able to identify however they wish and be respected for whatever that is. Communities should have the freedom to organize anyway they want without being interfered with. Those are basic rights that all people should have wherever they live on the planet.

I’m defending identity rather then making it subservient to white supremacy which is how America functions. Americans want “foreigners” to “assimilate”. I’m saying that people who come here don’t have to give up their cultural identity to make white people happy.

“you apply a very different standard to Asians, who seem to retain their “foreigner” status longer than either whites or blacks.”

Foreigner is an ideology, similar to racism, that people hold who are xenophobic and believe in Nationalism. Those aren’t ideologies I accept.

You think my statements take away from the necessity that Asians as community needed to organize as a defense against racism and State interference.

I believe that Black centrism is the best defense against white supremacy in America.

But how does that work with the Asian community ? Asians collectively have had and still experience the same discriminations and biases against them but the difference is they know what country they came from and many may have economic ties to those countries. And where they come from there are internal racial hierarchies that some adhere too. So when I suggest that communities with economic ties to their home countries remain China centric or Korean centric in order to amass economic power within the U.S. you interpret that as a “perpetual foreigner trope”.

I’m not arguing for white people here. I’m sticking my finger in the eye of “Merica.

I think you understand the problem of using the term Asian as a racialized term vs. using it as a term referring to continent of origin and how “Asian” can refer to recent temporary visitors from Asia as well as 7th-8th generation multiracial multiethnic citizens who have ancestors from Asia.

There is nothing like “white” vs. European and “black” vs. African. It is “Asian” vs. “Asian”, which can lead to confusion.

The term “African-American” came out of the “I don’t see color” movement from post-civil rights colour-blind racists in the 1980s, but since then has become racialized.

I met Congressman Frank Horton R-NY as a teenager after he introduced the resolution into Congress.

Maybe you can understand why I will challenge any notion that people of Asian descent are somehow less integral to the history, culture, language, and demographic composition and general national narrative of the United States than any other American. Makes my blood boil when people do that.

I personally feel this way because I have “some” European ancestors that were here before the Revolutionary war (ie, the French and Indian war), and most likely Native American ancestors also (millennia before that), but my Asian ancestors and family are no less part of the fabric of the USA than they are.

@ALL,

Seriously apologize that I have contributed partially to the derailment of the original topic of this post. I will try to steer any other discussion to a more appropriate post.

Having said that, I think it is still an important issue to address to both white and black readers, recent immigrants, as well as those outside the US, as exemplified by the discourse on this blog.

So when I suggest that communities with economic ties to their home countries remain China centric or Korean centric in order to amass economic power within the U.S. you interpret that as a “perpetual foreigner trope”.

Yes, it is. You are indeed using this trope. I am not just interpreting it.

Have you studied about the actual impact of the WWII internment experience on Japanese-Americans, before, during and after?
Have you studied about the actual impact of the Chinese Exclusion Act on Chinese-Americans, before, during and after?
Have you studied about the actual impact of the Luce-Cellar Act and other actions that stripped Filipinos of their US nationality, before, during and after?

Have you studied the experience of the descendants of Asians who went to other countries? How did China, Japan, Korea, etc. treat them?

Go out and do some more reading and studying and come back later after you learn a little more.

“Jew” (also spelled Chew in Toishan dialect) could be the Toishan/Sze Yap pronunciation of what is spelled Chiu or Chow/Chau in Cantonese (ie, Zhao / Chao or Zhou / Chou in Mandarin).
But, since it is a paper name not shared by any living relatives, I don’t know whose / what name it was originally. Her husband was born in Washington, DC. When her husband’s older brother came to the USA years later (after WWII), he used a name that reflected his original surname.

She includes her father’s paper name and her father’s original surname and her husband’s paper name in her full name that she uses. Neither she nor her husband use his original family surname, but his brother’s family does.

I need to read more of Ron Takaki’s books. I have only read excerpts from them.
However, I did read Iris Chang’s “the Chinese in America” a few months ago and realized I already knew about 95% of what she included. But I think that book’s target audience was possibly Asian Americans. What needs to be written is stuff to address the minds of people who still espouse the perpetual foreigner stereotype.

Well, and I’m familiar with Iris Chang but have so far read more about her than by her. I actually was at grad school at UIUC during part of her time as an undergrad there but never knew her.

So not having read it yet, I don’t know how her book would compare to Takaki’s. You might already know everything in “Strangers from a Different Shore,” too, but it’s still a great read.

I think you might find Takaki’s “A DIfferent Mirror” even more interesting. He interweaves the experiences of all the various minority groups and throws in the Irish as well. Lots of comparison and contrast of their experiences and their reactions to white Anglo discrimination, lots of examination of times the groups worked together and times they were in conflict with each other.

About what you wrote to MJB: “Have you studied the experience of the descendants of Asians who went to other countries? How did China, Japan, Korea, etc. treat them?”

Don’t even need to leave the US to have that experience, honestly. That’s another thing many people seem to be unaware of, that there’s often a huge disconnect between the immigration generation and the American-born generation. And it has nothing to do with age, either. I’m most familiar with that dynamic among Asian Americans, but I’ve seen it in operation in other groups, too.

Abagond said :”This exchange is becoming hard to follow. How I understand it:

“From Asia” to Jefe seems to mean born in Asia. To MJB it might just mean having Asian ancestry. Not sure.

That was what I was implying.

“American” to Jefe seems to mean both US citizens and immigrants (some of whom are also citizens). To MJB it seems to mean just citizens.

The main thing MJB seems to keep tripping over is the perpetual foreigner stereotype. He seems to see Asians as colonizers or something, not a real part of the country.”

I have an ideological contradiction going on in my head. I see whites as colonizers and not really part of this country since it was stolen from Native Americans. The “real” part of the country is white supremacy. Everything else is an illusion. That said I have no problems with people or groups moving here because I also believe that freedom of movement is a human right. That would suggest I support “colonizers”. I’m not American centric but rather “rights centric”. But a by product of that is certain amount of color blindness.

Jefe said,

“Asian” was indeed a term ratified and designated by the US government in the late 70s, but after Americans (starting with University students) of different Asian backgrounds banded together during and after the 60s-70s civil rights era to address some of the shared issues that they faced, such as problems with the old Jim Crow terms, immigration and racist laws, Yellowface, as well as dehumanization during the Vietnam War, so it was in response to some of the pressure from different Asian groups. “Asian” was promoted at that time as a term of strength, similar to how “black” was promoted.”

What white supremacy does within the Western Empire is destroy the cultural identity of non whites and replace it with a white version. That is what America means by assimilation. I also get that many of the people you are speaking about no longer have ties going back to their homeland, nor speak the language. And it is Americans that still view them as “foreigners” which is “the perpetual foreigner stereotype.” America culturally appropriates both ideas and people.

Jefe said,

“Maybe you can understand why I will challenge any notion that people of Asian descent are somehow less integral to the history, culture, language, and demographic composition and general national narrative of the United States than any other American.”

I don’t believe I was challenging that.

“That’s another thing many people seem to be unaware of, that there’s often a huge disconnect between the immigration generation and the American-born generation.”

That is true. But what I have noticed is that more immigrants are holding onto their language and culture then maybe previous generations. This may be because a segment of that population have economic bridges still in place to their home countries.

Kiwi said:

“A big problem I’ve noticed on this blog is that some Blacks and some Whites that are sympathetic to Blacks often espouse the notion that Whites and Blacks come first and that all other races are secondary. You have to understand that it really rubs people the wrong way when a blog that has established a reputation for criticizing injustice, inequality and other races for not championing Black causes is undisguisedly driven by racist self-interest.”

“A country with a multiracial future like America should not have a racial center, be it White or Black. The fundamental problem is that the human race has never had a center to begin with. As a country, all Americans need to move past the idea that any one race must be center or dominant.”

To clarify I think a “rights centric” future is best for any country. When I’m arguing for Black centrism it is not so that their should be a Black Empire of the kind Somali Prince speaks of. I’m arguing for that as a way to counter balance the current white centric Empire that holds both judicial and economic hegemony around the planet. The idea behind Black centrism is to build economic empowerment from draining the white centric base. Political influence comes with economic power and not necessarily from the ballot box.

The problem I ran into in this thread and discussion was me applying the same solution to the “Asian community”. I am trying to be philosophically congruent in how I view the world through my “rights oriented” lens. I wasn’t able to articulate that without relying on racialized language. The problem is I was not comfortable putting all Asians into the same group as I recognize Asian culture and communities as diverse. It could be that my “rights based ” views puts blinders on me and I, like Mirkwood with his class reductionist views, have created a blind spot.

I do believe that the Chinese who come here, invest and keep homeland ties, will create an economic power base here within the U.S. and that is another way to drain the white economic hegemony and weaken white supremacy. The same would be true of any group who come here from other countries.

The idea is that diverse groups can coexist through mutual respect. Firstly through rights recognized amongst individuals between different groups. Secondly from economic strength and thirdly from being able to defend it.

It seems to me that we would want a system that maximizes personal freedom yet keeps intact cultural diversity. A society where we don’t have one over arching hierarchy dictating a singular standard by which all things must ne judged.

I do appreciate Jefe taking the time to question me. I’m not entirely sure I get it but I’m open for addressing my own biases. The things I believe aren’t set in stone and are malleable.

I have read excerpts from Takaki’s books, but not the whole books. I do want to do that. Abagond has referred to his books for some of his posts.

Indeed, you do not have to leave the USA to understand the disconnect between immigrants (or any other migrants, including slaves) and their descendants. There is even a huge disconnect for most Native American groups too who are living in the very same region as their ancestors (ie, didn’t go anywhere). This causes whites and blacks to claim that they are no longer authentic.

The problem is that Americans do not see that right within their own population. Certain groups are perpetual foreigners, no matter how cut off from their “homeland” they are. If it is so difficult to see this right in the USA, maybe it is easier for some of them to understand the context in another place, e.g., Nisei/Sansei/Yonsei in Brazil or for the ethnic Chinese in Indonesia.

“Indeed, you do not have to leave the USA to understand the disconnect between immigrants (or any other migrants, including slaves) and their descendants. There is even a huge disconnect for most Native American groups too who are living in the very same region as their ancestors (ie, didn’t go anywhere). This causes whites and blacks to claim that they are no longer authentic.”

That’s a good point. I was thinking less of the authenticity as seen by cultural outsiders and more about the tensions that can arise between the immigrant generation and the native-born generation. And the reason I added that age has nothing to do with it is that I’ve seen it happen not just with parents and children but same-age peers (e.g., Mexican immigrant/naturalized citizen chewing out native-born Hispanic Americans for not knowing Spanish).

“The problem is that Americans do not see that right within their own population. Certain groups are perpetual foreigners, no matter how cut off from their “homeland” they are. If it is so difficult to see this right in the USA, maybe it is easier for some of them to understand the context in another place, e.g., Nisei/Sansei/Yonsei in Brazil or for the ethnic Chinese in Indonesia.”

First you’d have to get Americans to acknowledge their existence. I honestly don’t think most Americans realize there are ethnic Japanese in Brazil, ethnic Chinese not just in Indonesia but all over that region, ethnic Indians in Kenya, etc., much less that they’ve been in those countries for generations.

^ to put it simply, they are foreigners in their ancestral countries, no real difference from white or black Americans going to Europe or Africa.

Imagine a white or black person with 4 grandparents originally from the USA who speaks and writes only Korean fluently, and a few words and phrases of broken English with a Korean accent. Suppose they don’t even know the myths of the Pilgrims or how Manhattan was bought for $24 or how George Washington chopped the cherry tree, nor able to recite a single Mother Goose rhyme. You think Americans, even Korean Americans, would recognize them as a fellow American?

I was using the word “Asian” rather ambiguously because I live around people who view themselves with a specific identity.

Its not possible to guess where somebody is from so i don’t go there nor does it matter because i judge people for what they do not by what they look like. I’m all for people coming here and resisting this idea that they have to conform to “white society”. F**K that. White society is a narcistic joke. If you want to end white supremecy then you need to drain their economy and empower your own community. It’s not about what you think is “America” suppose to be because that’s a lie. It’s about living your life free from interference from bigots and the State. America face of the Western Empire, needs to die if the world expects to live peacefully.

This conversation started about economic empowerment. My main point is that communities with economic bridges back to their homelands have a greater chance of establishing economic power here that counters white economic hegemony. Your response is that the majority of immigrants here don’t have ties back to their homeland. and that Americans still view Asians as foreiners even though they have history here. O.K. i accept that.

Where I work and live I’m surrounded by people from all over the world. Its a multicultural bread basket. 200 different languages are spoken in los Angeles. 34 ethnic communities have homes here larger then any other enclave in the United States. Their are not foreigners to me because they are my neighbors. It doesn’t make me an “expert” but rather a partner in an economy.

My son goes to college in Pocotello Idaho. I was up their last week. It is werid being surrounded by white people. It is foreign to me. It made me uncomfortable being thier. My son mentioned it as being “strange”.

In L.A. it’s white people that call the police all the time and cause problems within my community. The richer the white person the more likely they will screw you when it comes to money. It’s white people judging my employees and telling me I’m paying them to much or claiming men who worked for me over 20 years are “liars”. Or the police profiling them for traffic violations they didn’t do. It’s white people that talk about how great “diversity” is, then following through with gentrification because it “good” for the community at the expense of the working poor.

Some white lady was complaining to me that her Asian neighbor acted “entitled”. White people don’t like it when other people beat them at their own game. White people have a monopoly on what it is to be American. Success to me is something to respect and emulate. Her response shows here own failures in life based on her own presumed privilage of being an “American”.

I’m not sure why we are arguing Jefe. Some communities have more ties back to their homeland then others. Asian communities today have more economic bridges back to where they came from then they did previously in American history.

Whites have one way economic bridges sucking resources from all over the planet. It doesn’t matter whether you are white European or white American the benefit is the same. The economic hegemony already ties whites together.

“In the United States last year, more than $120 billion was sent by workers to families abroad – making it the largest sender of remittances in the world. More than $23 billion went to Mexico, $13.45 billion to China, $10.84 billion to India and $10 billion to the Philippines, among other recipients.”

I’m not sure why you keep referring to people as foreigners. Are you viewed yourself as a foreigner where you live ? You are talking about people who are my neighbors and a part of our community. People who I trust and do business with.

The discussion was about economic empowerment. An economic bridge is when money flows both directions. I showed you that such bridges exist within some communities and that the Chinese one has the potential to challange white economic hegemony. I support that because it weakens the American Empire and by default white supremecy.

The idea that “foreigners” act any different then white Americans is xenophobic and racist. Humans all pretty much want the same things. A home, a family, a job.

The issue as I see it is this: Jefe has pointed out numerous times that many Asian Americans are not immigrants. You acknowledge that but in the same breath go back to discussing them solely as immigrants.

This is a real sore spot. Asian Americans deal with this misconception every day. “No, where are you really from?” “You speak really good English.” “So how long have you been in our country?”

My spouse says he’s never completely felt like a real American because other people won’t let him be one. Because he gets crap like this–mostly from whites, sometimes from blacks–every single day.

As far as minorities building economic power: as long as whites hold other sorts of power, it’s nothing for whites to destroy any economic stronghold a minority community creates. Look at what happened to the Japanese-American businesses in California during the Second World War. Look at Black Wall Street. Look at what happened to European Jews in the 1930s.

Also, I know you don’t see or put any stock in national boundaries, but that’s not the way most people think, no matter where they live. Those overseas home buyers in China are making a foreign investment. Many of them, perhaps the majority, have no intention of settling in the US or becoming American citizens. They’re wealthy families speculating in real estate. They aren’t building an economic power base to aid Chinese Americans, much less Japanese Americans.

“So what is your “economic empowerment” model, say, for black Americans and Native Americans? The one that is going to break up white hegemony within the USA?”

It is not a model so much as a strategy. The idea is to keep as many dollars spent in those communities within those communities. Sharinalr has pointed out in other posts that whites gain monetarily through gentrification for example. There are markets directed at non whites that enrich the white economy, so taking that market share away and replacing it with Black owned or to those within their communities is part of building an economic base. A strong economic base means keeping as much of the money generated in those communities within them.

Jefe said,

“Or is it only Chinese-Americans (and somehow other Asian Americans too) have this unique bridge to China?”

I already pointed out to you that I’m not talking about just the Asian community. As the article I posted above states:

“In the United States last year, more than $120 billion was sent by workers to families abroad – making it the largest sender of remittances in the world. More than $23 billion went to Mexico, $13.45 billion to China, $10.84 billion to India and $10 billion to the Philippines, among other recipients.”

120 billion dollars represents a lot of money being sent abroad. That indicates millions of families that still maintain ties to their home countries and are not cut off.

This is your quote in the “Game of Empire thread”

“Most black Americans rely on the same financial and legal system (eg, banking and credit, insurance, public security) as whites, which is not keen on investing in black neighborhoods, esp. the poorer ones. They also rely on white supply and distribution networks. They also cannot always rely on other blacks to provide them with business training and models.”

I agree with that. Thus our conversation.

“Some Asians and some Latinos can tap into systems which operate outside the mainstream white system.”

I agree with that too yet in this thread you seem to contradict that statement with “and therefore not materially different from whites and blacks.” Discussing that aspect of your statement has been what I have been focusing on in this thread and you have put up some resistance to that mainly in part in how I went about framing the discussion.

“The challenge would be to set up those parallel systems that are not bound by the “rules” of the white mainstream institutions.”

Again I agree. But the logical conclusion of this observation is what I call “Black centrism” for the Black community. The same strategy should be used for the “Asian Community” and it was in this area that my own confusion developed in how to describe that since the Asian community is so diverse with multiple economic bridges leading back to distinct communities.

What would be helpful would be for you to go back to my statements that created the “perpetual foreigner stereotype” and show me how to reword them so as to not create that stereotype yet keep intact my original premise that economic bridges going back to varies homelands help build economic bases here.

Solitaire said,

“Those overseas home buyers in China are making a foreign investment. Many of them, perhaps the majority, have no intention of settling in the US or becoming American citizens. They’re wealthy families speculating in real estate.”

That is true but their investments are largely within the Asian American communities so the wealth of Asian Americans indirectly increases both in real estate as well as jobs created.

“That is true but their investments are largely within the Asian American communities so the wealth of Asian Americans indirectly increases both in real estate as well as jobs created.”

Even if true, this has absolutely no impact on Asian Americans living in majority-white communities. This money isn’t going to be spent on advocacy groups working to combat discrimination and protect the constitutional rights of Asian Americans.

Money set aside for investment builds an economic base and from that political advocacy becomes more relevant because their is monetary power to back it up.

To get an idea of the different demographic makeups in Southern California look at the Wikipedia pages for the cities of Pasadena, Arcadia, Sam Marino and Monterey Park. These are cities where I do work in.

If you look at Korean investment in the U.S. you get these figures.

“U.S. subsidiaries of South Korean firms employed 32,300 U.S. workers in 2011. The average yearly salary for these workers is $83,000.”

So whether the investment money is coming from China, Korea or other countries it helps employ American workers, many of them Asian American.

To minimize your over indulgence of the perpetual foreigner stereotype, you could do things like

– Stop using examples of foreigners investing in the USA as an example of Americans (native born and immigrant US citizens) having direct family and monetary ties to foreign nations
– Insist that Asians are any different in this regard than whites or blacks
– Recognize that these investments by foreigners that you encounter have little general impact on ethnic communities in the USA (as Solitaire pointed out to you)
– Recognize that the parallel institutions set up in the USA within ethnic communities is a SEPARATE and materially DIFFERENT thing from overseas foreign investors to the USA. It is entirely a domestic USA issue. If you agreed with what I said, then you would not invoke all this stuff about foreign investors from overseas.
An example: a Chinese American US-based clan organization in a US city setting up a credit union to provide loans to its US resident members.

– Your example of remittances abroad is more about where recent immigrants come from (than about established community ties to a foreign country). If suddenly there was a surge in immigration from Nigeria, you would see a spike in remittances going there. That does not mean that black Americans retain ties to a foreign country in a way that whites do not.

Your entire set of arguments is rife with perpetual foreigner stereotypes.

For example, this one:

“the majority of immigrants here don’t have ties back to their homeland. and that Americans still view Asians as foreiners even though they have history here. O.K. i accept that.”

You are redefining “immigrant” to include people who are descendant of people who came from elsewhere. Superficially you acknowledge that “Americans” treat them as foreigners (thus acknowledging that there is a perpetual foreigner stereotype operating) whilst simultaneously calling them immigrants (invoking the perpetual foreigner stereotype yourself). When you use the word “immigrant” are you referring to all Americans in general (Except, perhaps, for native Americans)? Does that include YOU? Why is it just THEM?

THEN, in the next paragraph,

“Where I work and live I’m surrounded by people from all over the world. Its a multicultural bread basket. 200 different languages are spoken in los Angeles. 34 ethnic communities have homes here larger then any other enclave in the United States. Their are not foreigners to me because they are my neighbors. It doesn’t make me an “expert” but rather a partner in an economy. “

If most of them are US citizens, or even born in the US, why would they be a foreigner to you in the first place, despite their myriad cultural or linguistic backgrounds or social or residential attachment to an ethnic enclave?

Don’t you see how you invoked the perpetual foreigner stereotype yet AGAIN?

I can still understand to some extent, maybe about 50-60%, the rural Chinese dialect spoken by my great-grandfather who first arrived in the USA in the 1870s. However, I do not know any of the rural German dialect of my German great-grandfather who first arrived in the USA in the 1880s.
It is because I made an effort to try to remember my grandfather’s language. It is not because of maintained family and economic ties to a foreign country. I would be very upset at any suggestion that it has anything to do with that (as you can very well see).

I made a serious effort to learn other Chinese dialects (eg, Mandarin, Cantonese) as well as other European languages (French, Spanish) but these have nothing to do with family ties, even though I technically had a French great great great grandfather.

“My spouse says he’s never completely felt like a real American because other people won’t let him be one. Because he gets crap like this–mostly from whites, sometimes from blacks–every single day.”

It is not just crap. Sometimes it translates into real direct discrimination. I have had multiple times where I was refused a job interview or where realtors refused to show me apartments because of the perceived connection to some foreign country. Even in the interviews, they asked how long I had been in the country and if I had the right to work there.

The thing is, I have ancestors in the USA dating back all the way to before the Revolutionary war, and likely some millennia before that.

But overseas, I am also incessantly treated like a foreigner. I have been living in HK for over 20 years, bought my place almost 15 years ago, understand the local language, but without fail, multiple times daily, I had to put up with these foreigner comments and sometimes direct discrimination (the reverse of what I got in the USA). I tell myself that decades of that treatment in the USA helped me psychologically to deal with the same crap elsewhere.

Thank you for carrying on this discussion. Speaking for myself, I get caught up in me and my black issues that I never take the time to look at issues affecting others. Like many I saw the Chinese and other groups as being able to just go back home in hard times. I seem to be mistaken in that view.

The greater point that needs to be made is that Black Americans need to see themselves as having a rightful stake in the US. Instead of feeling they need to “go back” to “their countries”, they need to believe that America is their country, too.

Thanks for pointing this out.

I always agreed that whites spew out all sorts of broken record arguments to absolve themselves of responsibility for historical and current racist treatment of blacks and others, but there are some broken record arguments or stereotypes that even some blacks believe in which need to be dispelled, e.g.,

– Model Minority
– Perpetual Foreigner
And the broken record corollary “Y’all can go back. We can’t.
(Or maybe one of its variants, e.g, “You all have a home country. We don’t.”)

Is Mercutio Southall advocating that Black Americans “go back” to Africa? No. He’s fighting for his rights, right here, right now.

It did get off topic, but from what I remember, that was the doing of Somali Prince. In any case, I did not put a stop to it since it seemed to be a productive conversation and I did not have a post for what is an argument that has come up before. When Somali Prince tried to derail the Laquan McDonald thread, I did stop that.

“I would expect that to be true. Where I live isn’t like the rest of the country.”

“To get an idea of the different demographic makeups in Southern California…”

I used to live in SoCal. My spouse grew up there. His parents and other family members still live there, as well as many of our friends and colleagues. So I’m familiar with the demographics on the ground.

For some reason, you seem to think all Asians live in ethnic enclaves in SoCal. You don’t seem to be aware of the multiethnic communities like the one in which my spouse grew up. You don’t seem to realize that there are Asian Americans in SoCal living in majority-white neighborhoods and suburbs.

“Their are advocacy groups all ready in place specifically for Chinese Americans. I Imagine their are other advocacy organizations directed to Koreans, those from the Philippines ect.”

And pan-Asian American groups as well. I’m quite aware of this. My point was, mainland Chinese investors are not going to donate any money to these groups, nor will they become involved in these causes.

Some of their money might help a relatively small number of Asian Americans in the form of jobs. But they’re not going to be putting money behind pan-Asian American efforts to increase awareness and combat discrimination.

If you’ve been paying attention to Jefe, he’s been trying to tell you that most overseas Chinese view American-born Chinese as foreigners, not as their compatriots. And that doesn’t even start to describe their attitude towards non-Chinese groups of Asian Americans or towards people of interracial descent.

I mean, I’m already forseeing trouble in that Texas development Long Lake (in the article you linked to) between the Taiwanese Chinese who’ve been there since the 1980s and the new infux of mainlanders. That community center is either not going to be used by the newcomers from mainland China, or it’s going to be the site of a heated battle over which flag stays on the wall (among other things).

Based on my experience in New York, tons of money is passing back and forth between the US and Britain, probably more than between any other two points on Earth. British Americans lived in enclaves, retaining their own culture, language and values. Instead of embracing American culture, they destroyed it through genocide and boarding schools. They have forced everyone else in America to assimilate to THEIR culture, even those they brought here at gunpoint. It worked: I am writing in their ancestral language. And they have YOU fretting about people not giving up their mother tongues.

“It is not just crap. Sometimes it translates into real direct discrimination.”

Oh, absolutely. Case in point, even though he hasn’t been out of the US in ~30 years, he keeps his passport current and always carries it on him because he never knows when he’s going to get stopped for walking while brown by some cop demanding to know if he’s here legally, and he’s been in situations where his driver’s license didn’t cut it as sufficient proof.

“The thing is, I have ancestors in the USA dating back all the way to before the Revolutionary war, and likely some millennia before that.”

If we’d been able to have kids, they’d have been Mayflower descendants on my side. So they would’ve been a lot like you in that respect.

I’m not in a place to look up the stats right now, but I believe most white Americans can trace at least part of their heritage to the huge European immigration wave that happened c. 1880-1910. That means your ancestors pre-date them on both sides, your Chinese ancestors having arrived well before that. Yet you’re seen as a perpetual foreigner and they’re not. Very unfair.

“But overseas, I am also incessantly treated like a foreigner. I have been living in HK for over 20 years, bought my place almost 15 years ago, understand the local language, but without fail, multiple times daily, I had to put up with these foreigner comments and sometimes direct discrimination (the reverse of what I got in the USA). I tell myself that decades of that treatment in the USA helped me psychologically to deal with the same crap elsewhere.”

I did not have a post for what is an argument that has come up before.

Last week after you suggested we may need something, I drafted something and hit 500 words in about 10-15 mins, then looked for a suitable photo.

But I thought it was too fast, and needed to take a break and look back at it. In all honesty, I might be willing to contribute ideas to a post, but I am not sure I want to be the sole author to a guest post. Maybe you could treat it as an initial draft that you can add your own take to?

“For some reason, you seem to think all Asians live in ethnic enclaves in SoCal. You don’t seem to be aware of the multiethnic communities like the one in which my spouse grew up. You don’t seem to realize that there are Asian Americans in SoCal living in majority-white neighborhoods and suburbs.”

That wasn’t my point at all. If I was making that argument I would have listed China Town and not Pasadena. Pasadena is 14% Asian American. In fact if you look at the Wikipedia pages I suggested you’ll see that none of those cities are “ethnic enclaves” (Which sounds like perpetual foreigner stereo type to me) but most have Asian Americans living their ranging from 40 to 50 percent of the residents. They also have political representation within those cities.

I also want to make clear that my focus on the economics behind different communities wasn’t meant to be a deflection from the history or current biases against Asian Americans.

What has become clear to me is that you can’t show an economic correlation between home countries and American citizens living here in terms of economic empowerment.

It did get off topic, but from what I remember, that was the doing of Somali Prince. In any case, I did not put a stop to it since it seemed to be a productive conversation and I did not have a post for what is an argument that has come up before. When Somali Prince tried to derail the Laquan McDonald thread, I did stop that.

Yes, I am largely responsible for how this thread went off-topic. Regardless, I think you have made the right calls so far, Abagond.

Some arguments degenerate into name-calling whilst others morph into very intellectual discussions.

The contributions to this thread, particularly from Jefe, MJB and Solitaire, have been quite interesting to read.

Based on my experience in New York, tons of money is passing back and forth between the US and Britain, probably more than between any other two points on Earth. British Americans lived in enclaves, retaining their own culture, language and values. Instead of embracing American culture, they destroyed it through genocide and boarding schools. They have forced everyone else in America to assimilate to THEIR culture, even those they brought here at gunpoint. It worked: I am writing in their ancestral language. And they have YOU fretting about people not giving up their mother tongues.

I agree with what you wrote.

Does that not then prove that economic bridges exist between certain ethnicities?

Why does MJB stating that an economic bridge exists between people of Chinese descent differ subtantially from you stating that an economic bridge exists between Whites?

Or is your argument that the economic bridge built between Whites has obliterated the possibility of any other economic bridge?

“Why does MJB stating that an economic bridge exists between people of Chinese descent differ subtantially from you stating that an economic bridge exists between Whites?”

I’m not sure how Abagond would view it but the worlds economy is largely white centric. What I mean by that is the white Western world has an economic monopoly and part of that is the dollar acts as an Imperial currency. Thus the IMF, World Bank. Its how to control an economy from afar without stationing troops.

I’ve come too see that there are separate economic highways that are not related when it comes to how they effect different communities here in the U.S.

Their are plenty of economic highways leading to the U.S. from a number of countries. I first thought those highways would benefit in some way the “ethnic” communities represented by these different counties. In looking at the numbers that’s not true. They benefit all Americans in general.

The money leaving the U.S. (120 billion) doesn’t do anything to empower communities here. At first I imagined these highways as supporting my hypothesis but under closer scrutiny I see they are independent and have no direct relation towards having anything to do with building economic empowerment within specific communities here.

This PDF lays out which countries have the most corporate franchises in the U.S.

– There is considerable more Foreign Direct Investment in the US from Europeans (in Europe) compared to Asians (in Asia)
– Japan is no. 2 FDI in the US, but that has little if any relationship to Japanese Americans or their communities or organizations in the USA.

So, it seems that whites have a lot more connection to foreign investors to the USA than do Asian Americans. Even the ones from Asia impact whites more than anyone else.

This is what the Western Empire looks like. Each country has its own sovereignty, wears its own hat, but is economically linked as a singular economic hegemony.

South and Central America, the Middle East, and Africa have the least amount of “direct investment” are the ones most exploited by the Western Empire for their resources. Their wealth gets counted as wealth within the Western Empire and not as their own.

“Cumulatively, Europe is the largest regional investor in the United States. It provided more than two-thirds of all foreign investment through 2013. These figures include the 28 European Union countries and other European nations with an investment stake in the United States. For example, two non-EU member countries—Switzerland and Norway—accounted for more than 10 percent of cumulative investment from Europe by the end of 2013.”

The Asia and Pacific region ranked second accounting for 17 percent of FDIUS stock through 2013. Canada held nine percent.

The Caribbean countries made up the fourth-largest investment region at $74 billion as of year-end 2013. The British Islands (British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Montserrat, and Turks and Caicos Islands) ranked first in Caribbean investment.

The stock of direct investment from South and Central America, the Middle East, and Africa remains tiny. By the end of 2013, each represented less than one percent.

I am thinking that the people who are best suited (at least psychologically) at uprooting themselves and going elsewhere are the people in the “transplant” category as they are not yet “rooted” in the USA, yet not from one of the “uprooted” backgrounds.

The ones who can pick up and go elsewhere the easiest may be the “perpetual transplant” types, who already have generational transplant experience.

It is not a fixed thing, and certainly not all persons associated with a particular ethnic group fit neatly into the relevant category. Some Irish Americans could still be transplants if they experienced the USA as a transplant (eg, growing up in a neighborhood without WASPs,eg, a black or hispanic neighborhood), but some from the transplant category might have worked so hard to be rooted that they no longer feel like a transplant.

I think it is not a matter of “going back” but leaving “home” and going somewhere else, possibly to a new home without getting homesick. That takes a psychological frame of mind that the “rooted” and “uprooted” might not have.

Most Taiwanese American families in the USA have already been uprooted and transplanted at least twice already (some many more). It is not as much a psychological stretch for one, say, to leave their home in New Jersey and go to Shanghai (where they have no direct connection). The same with Americans whose parents or grandparents came from Hong Kong or Singapore.

I know Filipinos who have worked in 4-5 different countries already, and in different countries from the rest of their families. Psychologically, they are better equipped to pick up and move elsewhere.

Another group that could pick up and go somewhere else – Third Country Kids (TCKs), particularly those from multinational or multiracial backgrounds who grew up in several different places and never felt rooted in the first place, in their “home” countries or abroad. Someone like Obama could have easily just picked up and gone elsewhere (just like his half brother in Shenzhen). However, Obama specifically did not want to be a perpetual transplant and wanted a wife and kids that did not have to grow up like that. But his brother is like that.

THAT is the main difference, not some magical bridge to China or Israel and definitely not a set of countries willing to support a diaspora around the world.

I think that also might explain why many of the non-Asian Americans I run into in Asia have Jewish background. Most WASP Americans I meet overseas do not stay long (unless they marry a local). They get way too homesick for the society where they feel they are part of the majority.

For blacks who are not of recent West Indian or African origin, they will have to make a greater effort to turn themselves into a transplant. But it is not impossible as I have seen people do this. The ones living in the North may have had grandparents who were born in the South who left and went North to an unfamiliar environment. There might be something left in some of them which could convince them that they could do it again.

Individuals turning themselves into transplants can, in effect, create bridges leading BACK HOME to the USA.

When I read about how some believe that certain diaspora have a home country to bat for them (and thus “clout”), or that there is some foreign sovereignty somewhere which has some permanent back door open, I knew that something was amiss. All along, I just thought that I don’t see why most whites and blacks just do the same thing, but couldn’t put my finger on it, and I do not agree with Amy Chua’s take on it.

But I think your concept of rootedness might shed light on it. The feeling of being a rootless transplant (a perpetual outsider, instead of a perpetual foreigner) can be an explanation why certain people feel the need to form new bridges elsewhere. They certainly will when times get tough (like expulsion pogroms). Otherwise, they will find ways to hasten their assimilation.

Actually, a lot of native American tribes did become rootless transplants in the 1700s and 1800s, but many joined other tribes or went to Canada to join other tribes there.

An interesting post topic could be “Overseas Americans” discussing what kind of Americans voluntarily expatriate themselves and to where.

Americans are the largest “expatriate” community in HK. In over 20 years, I have met maybe 2 black Americans in HK (and I was involved with the American Chamber of Commerce for a while), and did not run into any in Japan or Taiwan or China and a few in the Philippines (many who were sent there by the military, and decided to stay behind, perhaps after marrying a local).
That is not to say there are no blacks. There are. But the vast majority are from Africa. I see Africans in HK daily. And in Guangzhou, there is a community of over 100,000 of them – enough to form large communities and myriad institutions to serve the African community.

There are Americans too. US companies employ at least 10% of the workforce in HK and they are full of both expats sent from the home country and other Americans who just came to work for them. But … … no blacks. I meet more American Latinos than blacks overseas. Even most Anglos don’t stay long — most come for a few years and then leave. I think you will find the same thing among the American Chambers of Commerce (AmCham) across Asia.

When Americans expatriate themselves, the US government thinks that they do it for tax reasons. There is no other conceivable reason (to the govt) why Americans would consider leaving the US for long times or even permanently.

Do people think the expatriate Americans in South America or Africa are any different?

Upate (December 16th): Yet another racist incident at a Trump rally, two days ago in Las Vegas.

While a Black Lives Matter protester was being manhandled by security, Trump supporters were shouting stuff like:

“Kick his ass!”
“Shoot him!”
“Light the motherfucker on fire!”

As another protester was removed, someone shouted

“Sieg heil!”

It gets worse, as BuzzFeed reports:

“Trump, meanwhile, gleefully narrated the madness from his podium like a tabloid talk show host presiding over an on-camera brawl between guests — egging on the confrontation, whipping the audience into a frenzy, and basking in his fans’ celebratory chants.

“Trump! Trump! Trump! Trump!”

“This is what we should have been doing to the other side for the last seven years!” Trump exclaimed during one of the scuffles with protesters.”